


unfinished fix it fic i will never finish bc it's been 3 years but i hate seeing it in my gdocs

by royh



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Fix-It, M/M, Post S4, Unfinished, and will never be finished
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-09
Updated: 2020-07-09
Packaged: 2021-03-04 19:41:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 64,452
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25161811
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/royh/pseuds/royh
Summary: After defeating Zarkon, the team has to go their separate ways. Keith is asked to help the Blade of Marmora revitalize Galra society on a brand new planet, where the threat of a rebel group rises to the occasion. Lance, back on earth, finds a way to get back in contact with Keith through means that make him question the Garrison’s validity. Letters and polaroids are sent between the two, making Keith fall for Lance all over again and Lance face his true feelings for Keith.unfinished, and will stay that way
Relationships: Keith/Lance (Voltron)
Comments: 1
Kudos: 5





	1. the veldis task

**Author's Note:**

> hello. i have made a burner account for this fic. isn't that fun!
> 
> i don't particularly have any grievances with vld/kl fandom in regard to my fics, but i think many people who were a part of it can agree that it was Bad. Bad (TM). so before you go and read this fic, if you want to read this author's note, go ahead.
> 
> i started writing this fic when i was 16. klance was my comfort ship, Keith was my comfort character, and before s4 dropped, vld was my comfort show. i was never engaged with fandom on any social media and it was something that brought me and my best friend close together. s4 ruined my comfort, and then each season ruined it more until finally the idea of vld in general was awful. i posted some fix-it/aus on my main ao3 acc after s8 dropped for consolidation, but that was it.
> 
> s4 ruined me so much that i planned a 32 chapter fix-it post-canon fic and was hellbent on posting it when i _completed it_. im kind of grateful i never did. If you do decide to read this fic, i'll explain what happens in the rest of the fic, though 30 chapters remain unwritten and will forever remain as so.
> 
> honestly, im only posting this 3 years later because it makes me sad. im 19 now and have moved on to new fandoms but everytime i open google docs and see the 60k+ words i wrote at 16, my heart sinks a little. for plenty of reasons: i thought vld would redeem itself, i thought i would finish something so ambitious, and i never got to post something i was so passionate about. i only recently broke 60k words on a wip im currently working on—three fucking years later—and im not giving up on it anytime soon, but at least people have read it. at least my friends have told me how much they love it, have made art for it, have made me feel happy about it. and sometimes i think, well, maybe i could have had that reality with this fic, but i didn't. and that's okay.
> 
> idk how many people will read this. honestly, im surprised ppl are still reading kl fics. everytime i get a comment on the kl fics i do have posted on my main acc, it's kind of like a soft pat to the face.
> 
> this fic is unedited. i haven't touched it since i was 16, and my writing has gotten way better, but i really don't have the energy to edit it.
> 
> so with that said, here's the fic wip i never finished, and never will.

Keith hates space.

Space gave him trouble. He thought he had enough trouble on  _ Earth _ , but space? Space was a whole other level.

A quick rundown of everything that’s happened to Keith in  _ space _ :

  1. Flown out into _space_ on a blue robot lion
  2. Forced into protecting the universe aka _space_
  3. Somehow ended up being paladin ( _space_ warrior) worthy
  4. Knife from childhood apparently from _space_
  5. His mom is apparently from _space_
  6. Keith is half Galra! A _space_ species!
  7. Zarkon ( _space_ dictator) was a complete dick to him and his friends
  8. Helped the Blade of Marmora ( _space_ rebels) for a bit
  9. Saw way too many sacrifice themselves for _space_
  10. Victory or death victory or death victory or death victory or death ( _space_ mantra, probably)



It’s been a shit show since he got here.

Now what had space done to him?

Well, space wouldn’t let him go back home.

Zarkon was defeated around six months ago. His right-hand witch—apparently Lotor’s mom, and Zarkon’s kind of estranged wife? Her name is Honerva. It was a weird plot twist—begged mercy and is somewhere living on Altea with her son. The battle was hell, and Keith stays up at night because the nightmares are terrible. Lots of stuff happened that Keith doesn’t want to return to. The nights are slowly getting easier to sleep through, but usually only after a long day of work.

Anyways, Zarkon’s defeat left thousands of Galra just….wandering. They were under his rule for ten thousand years and now he was gone. They lived on battleships for those years, serving and protecting a cause that was never meant for their wellbeing.

The Galra weren’t to blame, the Blades told Keith. Most of these people were born into Zarkon’s reign. They just ran with it. They could have known better, yes, but unless they knew about the Blade of Marmora, they had nowhere to go. Kolivan wasn’t even sure if they knew what Daibazaal was.

And that’s when Keith was given a brand new responsibility. Not the rest of the paladins, just Keith.

And it was to get the Galra back on their feet.

Keith is half Galra, a paladin of Voltron, and a member of the Blade of Marmora—the perfect lineup to help re-establish a society that once flourished. That’s why this task, the Veldis Task, was given to  _ him. _

Half Galra? That’s true. Keith hasn’t had much time to explore this newfound heritage of his because of how busy he’s been defending the universe. All the exploring he’s done is from being a Blade, and the only Galra thing to come out of that is being very,  _ very _ persistent. Which didn’t help him at all because he’s  _ always _ been persistent. So, helping the Galra could allow him to learn more and feel  _ one _ with them.

Paladin of Voltron? Well, that means Keith is protective and has “leadership skills” (he’s convinced himself he doesn’t). It also means he has experience with uniting people and earning their trust.

Member of the Blade of Marmora? He had no choice there. The Blade of Marmora are the ones leading the whole “help the Galra” thing and are a temporary government. So, as a Blade, this was pretty much his duty.

Every day, Keith wakes up on the planet of Veldis to entire packs of Galra waiting outside the headquarters. Just lines of Galra waiting to get food, clusters of people eating together, and—bonus—giving dirty looks!

The Galra don’t  _ like _ the Blade of Marmora. They despise them. Who would like the enemy of your previous ruler now governing you? No one. Keith wouldn’t. Allura would willingly shut herself in a cryopod if she was under Zarkon’s rule. Therefore, the Galra don’t like it very much either.

Some see the good the Blades are doing. They acknowledge their attempts and are quite grateful for it. Most don’t though. When the Veldis Task first began, few would show up to get their meal and supplies. Many were protesting the Blades by not receiving their basic necessities. Slowly, they all began to show up because they were starving and couldn’t live like that.

Keith’s job changes all the time. Sometimes he’s handing out meals, other times he’s helping with construction or he’s tending crops. Veldis is a perfect planet. Good for farming, stable grounds, beautiful rivers and lakes—sometimes he doesn’t mind being stuck here.

Today, Keith wakes up as the orange sun shines over the distant green hills. He loves seeing it happen through the window of his room. His gloomy, grey room, with only a single bed against the wall. He sits up to look at it, his blanket crumpling around his waist. It’s his favorite thing about being stuck on Veldis—the sky. Orange against the yellow sky, right before it turns blue. As a paladin and Blade, he was always on a ship. It was always dark out in space, despite the gleaming stars. Being on a planet and seeing the sunrise...it was like being on Earth. Having his own little room, alone, with his belongings around him was like the shack back on Earth.

The alarms blare, signaling for the Blades to get up and start working. Keith changes into his suit, throwing the hood over his head, activating his mask, and walking out into the hall. Other members walk by him, nodding their head at him as a way of greeting. Keith gives them a slight nod back and follows their lead. He always hated the white lights that filled the halls. They made the white walls even brighter, and the steel floors shinier. All the light messed with his head.

“Keith!” a voice—clearly Kolivan—calls out to him. Keith looks up from the ground and sees him at the end of the hall, leaning on the wall.

Keith likes Kolivan. He’s a good guy, dedicated to the Blade of Marmora, an excellent leader. Yet, there’s something about him that he doesn’t like. He doesn’t know what it is but he doesn’t  _ like _ it. It’s always been like that, even before he was a member of the Blade of Marmora. Since his trial, he didn’t like him. That made sense, considering how much that ruined  _ and _ changed him, but even after, he had time to like the guy. His dislike for him is an itch he can’t reach.

He jogs up to him. Kolivan puts his hand on his shoulder. Keith glares at it for a couple ticks, the gloved claws being the difference between a gentle touch and a pressing hold, then looks him in the eye.

“You’re not going to be doing this anymore,” Kolivan calmly states.

Keith’s eyes widen. Doing what? The Veldis Task? “What do you mean?” he asks, afraid of the answer.

“You know, serving food, helping build. We need you for something else.”

“Me? You need  _ me? _ ” Keith points at himself, his nail hitting the center of his chest. What could they need him for?

“Follow me.” Kolivan turns his back to him and begins to walk away from the hall. His big figure has always been intimidating. Keith walks behind him, unsure of what’s about to happen. What else could be happening besides rebuilding the Galra society? It’s all they’ve been doing. He’s seen high members of the Blade of Marmora doing exactly what he’s doing for  _ hours, _ sometimes even longer. Did they have time to meet outside of work?

They enter a hardly lit room and Keith takes his mask off. Three huge holo screens float in front of him. Below them is an orange control panel on a large platform. Keith concludes security footage is being displayed, based on the timestamp at the bottom left corner. The door slams shut behind, making his body jolt forward. Kolivan greets the others in the room, hidden in the shadows. Keith can tell they’re familiar faces, but he’s never formally been introduced. A lot of the Blades still like to keep their identity to themselves, despite the war being over. In fact, he’s surprised they even have their masks off.

“Show the security footage from a couple quintants ago,” Kolivan says, climbing the stairs to the platform as the light from the screen flooding around him.

The center screen changes to a different recording, the timestamp at the bottom indicating it’s from three minutes ago. The video is paused, but it shows five Galra huddling around in a circle. Three of them have furry ears at the top of their heads while the other two have pointy ears at both sides. They’re all the same height, making their huddle cover what they’re doing much more efficiently. They seem to be writing on some papers in a secluded area against the walls of one of the Blade of Marmora headquarters. It’s sunny out, but the shade cools the scene. All of them wear gray apparel.

“Play it.”

The five Galra write on the papers, visibly discussing in low voices. They pass them around and dissipate, exiting the screen. The footage changes again, still the same timestamp, but about an hour later. One of the Galra with light purple ears in the footage before walks by with a bag of materials. They pass by another Galra. The footage replays, this time slowed down and zoomed in on the Galra. The first Galra manages to slip the piece of paper into the other’s hand casually.

Several other videos are shown on screen, the same thing happening over and over again. It’s suspicious, of course, but Keith’s not sure what to do with what he’s seeing.

“We have reason to believe there’s a rebel group forming between the Galra,” Kolivan decrees. He turns around to face everyone in the room. “It’s the first time we catch it on camera, but we don’t know if this has been going on for a while or not.”

“Have you been able to decipher what’s on the papers?” Keith asks hesitantly. Something about the situation makes him feel like he shouldn’t be speaking.

“It’s written in code.”

“Then it’s clear it’s been going on for some time if they’ve written it out in code.”

Kolivan glares at him. “We don’t like to jump to conclusions, Keith.”

Keith clenches his fist, then subconsciously begins rubbing his thumb against his hand.

“They may be coming after the Blades,” Kolivan continues, “and we have to find out more about what they’re planning. We’ve been thinking of ways to prevent this.”

“What could they attack us with?” another Blade asks.

“The Galra know what they’re doing. They could have easily made something out of the materials we gave them or from something they previously owned. One way we’ve been thinking about preventing this is to stop handing out the bag of materials.”

“The Galra need these materials, Kolivan,” Keith speaks up. “I doubt  _ all _ of them are in—”

“We need to take every precaution possible,” he interrupts. He closes his eyes and purses his lips, trying his best to stay calm. “We’re trying to help them, Keith. If they’re going to fight us, then we have to make sure they  _ won’t _ . If cutting off the materials is how we can do so, then we’re going to do it.”

“That’s just going to cause trouble—”

“We’ll give them something else.”

“We  _ have _ nothing else—”

“Keith, listen to me!” Kolivan yells. Keith’s eyes widen. He’s never heard him yell before. Not even when he was being lectured was his voice raised, just a little irritated and demanding. “I brought you here because I trust you’ll do the right thing, as a  _ paladin _ , as a  _ Blade _ , and as a  _ Galra _ . We need your help disbanding this group of rebels. Can I put enough faith in you to help lead this new task?”

Wait.

“Help  _ lead? _ ” he repeats. They know he can’t  _ lead _ .  _ Keith  _ knows he can’t lead. Everyone should know that.

“You’ve helped the Blade of Marmora more than you know, during and after the war. You stayed here to help your people get back on their feet, and we believe you’d do anything to help them continue to do so without any obtrusion.”

Keith won’t deny he likes helping. If he’s needed for something, he’ll do it. Whether it benefits him or not, he’s willing to help.

But this feels different. It’s a big responsibility that he must take on. Disbanding a group of rebels? All he’s seen them do is pass notes. What else could they have in store?

“Can I?” Kolivan asks again.

Keith pauses for a few ticks, thinking it through one last time. This task will be much more fun than following the assembly line. He gets to observe from a distance, have some more time to himself, maybe even use his trusty blade. If he manages to succeed, maybe it’ll guarantee a better relationship between the Galra and the Blade of Marmora.

“Yes,” Keith answers.

******

After the meeting, Keith does what he’s supposed to do—help build stores. He does it for the whole day, working in silence with other Galra and Blade members. After reassuring Kolivan that he could take charge of the rebel group, he left Keith with no other information. He simply let him leave the room and go on with his day. It gave him time to think about how he could go about the mission and disassembling them, but nothing came to mind. He really had no idea how to do this, especially with such little details. Were they going to tell him what to do? Does he have to  _ actually _ take charge? Keith’s expecting the higher members of the Blade of Marmora to at least tell him the information  _ they’ve _ gathered. He can’t gather anything with what he has. He doesn’t have access to the cameras, he doesn’t have their identities. He can’t even investigate deeply.

Keith’s room door opens automatically at his presence. He takes off his mask and crashes down on his bed, looking out the window to see the sky turn from purple to night. Night on Veldis is beautiful. He loves it way more than the morning. The sky turns from yellow, to blue, to gray, to purple, to night. When the sky turns grey, the sun begins to set, and when it nears its end, the sky becomes purple. Then it’s night. The stars are  _ visible _ . It’s nice to look at stars from the ground and not from a battleship.

The last of the purple fades after a few ticks, and the stars come out to say goodnight. Keith softens a bit every time the sky changes. It’s soothing, it’s different. If he were to leave Veldis, he’d miss the sky.

A knock at his door tears his view from it. He gets up, pats himself downs, and allows the door to open. A familiar face greets him, though he’s never learned her name. She wears the uniform messengers do—a black turtleneck that glows purple along the seams and ends past her hips paired with skin tight gray leggings. Two thick braids of white hair come down past her shoulders, reaching the end of her forearm. Her ears jut out between the strands of hair at the side of her head. Thin eyebrows accentuate her small, slanted yellow eyes well. She has dark purple skin, except for the light purple spots that frame her face and point inward like a sword at her cheekbones. Like many other Galra, her chin is pointy. She holds an envelope in her hand. She’s years older than him—there is a wiseness that emanates from her. Experience is etched into her skin like scars. What has she gone through?

“How can I help you?” Keith asks, crossing his arms over his chest.

“Kolivan told me to pass along a message to you,” she says. Her voice is deep but shallow. “You are to meet him in the same room you were in this morning, tomorrow, before the alarms blare. He wants to give you information.”

“Oh,” he says. Perhaps they were going to help him a little. “Thank you.”

She stays still, not making a maneuver to move. She looks hesitant, unsure of whether she should leave or not.

“Is that all?” Keith asks.

“Uh, well, um.” She stammers, tapping her foot nervously. “Look, this is against protocol, and if they ever find out I’m doing this I can lose my job.”

Keith’s eyes widen. Sending a message to him could make her lose her job? “But didn’t Kolivan tell you to send this message?”

“Oh, no, I have a different message. But yeah, yeah, of course, I am a messenger but this already seems fishy and I don’t want to be caught on camera—”

“The cameras don’t reach my room,” Keith reassures her with a small smile, no matter how confused he is at this moment.

Her yellow eyes lighten up in surprise. “Oh, whew, good. Alright, at the messaging office we sometimes get a lot of mail from other diplomacies and planets, but earlier this ‘week’, as you humans call it, we got something from a planet that’s  _ never _ been able to send us anything. I saw it and hid it because I wasn’t sure if it was important, but it’s addressed to you.”

“What is a ‘week’ here?”

“Spicolian movement.”

“Yeah, just say week.” Keith stares at the envelope in her hands. He recognizes the brand. “Something from Earth?”

She earnestly nods. “It came on a little device. It opened up when I picked it up—there’s a pad under and I  _ may _ have accidentally pressed a button on it and it just, you know,  _ pwoosh _ .” She mimics the act by putting her hands together and moving them apart from each other horizontally. “Anyways, there was an envelope inside. The writing outside is in English, and I can’t read English so I figured it was for you and that lead me to the conclusion that it was from Earth. I kept the device, just in case. I don’t know if it’s from some important organization.” She looks down at the floor, playing with the end of her braids. “Wow, it probably sounds like I get into everyone else’s business and mail. I promise I don’t!” she reassures, raising her hands in front of her like a surrender.

“You sure?” Keith asks, a little concerned that she was looking through something she knew nothing about.

“Yes! I only looked at it because, I mean, the messaging office? Getting little airplanes flying through their window? I could have sent it to Kolivan, but I didn’t. I did some research myself, even though outside communication is  _ forbidden,  _ may I remind you.”

Keith shrugs. She has a good point, so he lets it slide.

“I can’t be here for any longer so.” She hands him the envelope, which he takes apprehensively. “If you need anything else, you can find me in the messaging office.” She leaves quickly, her steps small and fast.

The door closes, leaving Keith alone in his desolate grey room. His hand shakes as he holds the piece of paper.

Something from  _ Earth _ managed to be sent across the galaxy. How? As far as he knows, Earth doesn’t know about aliens. He doubts that, when the rest of the team got back, they believed them. If they didn’t believe Shiro the first time, what would make them believe Shiro and a group of troublesome Garrison pilots?

He sits down on his bed, carefully opening the back of the envelope. He pulls out a paper and unfolds it, immediately noticing the handwriting.

_ To: Keith _

_ Hey man. How’s it going? It’s Lance. It’s been…a while. A really long time, actually. _

_ Honestly, I’m not sure what to write. Funny, huh? I figure out how to send you mail and I don’t know what to write. How about I tell you how I figured out how to send intergalactic mail? _

_ So, the Garrison doesn’t believe in aliens still lol. We disappear for at least a year and a half and they completely disregard the story of us battling an evil force and risking our lives multiple times just so this shit planet can still exist. They think we’re lying! That we all made up some story about us being heroes. We told them you were still out in space, helping those who need it, that you’re  _ _ not _ _ missing, but they still decide to label you as missing. I mean, that makes sense, but I’m digressing. _

_ I did some work on my own. I’ve been figuring out how to get back in contact with you. I’m not super mathematic-y or whatever, but hell, I had to make myself be. I became a fucking mathematician for you. Anyways, I worked on equations and did so many trial runs. I hacked the Garrison! I hacked the Garrison for you, without Pidge’s help! They’re very much hiding information from the students and the general public, and turns out they  _ _ do _ _ know how to do some pretty advanced stuff. They have designs and work for future spaceships that can travel so much farther. They can barely get past Kerberos still, but with what I saw, they can definitely go farther than before.  _

_ Anyways, with that information, and spending a long time with technology that’s much more advanced than ours, I managed to beat their dumb asses! I made a little ship—think the size of a paper airplane—and managed to get it to travel the galaxy. After so many trials and errors, I got it to travel to Veldis. I’ve got so many copies of this stupid thing. I don’t even have a name for it. You know what? Think of a name for it. Anyways, you’ll probably find a prototype of it somewhere on your planet. All I know is it managed to get there! Wow, I really hope you get this. I’m writing this in hopes that you do. _

_ So yeah! How’s Veldis? How’s the Blade of Marmora doing? And those Galra! Have you learned anything yet? About your culture, I mean. And your family, too. Do they still have a stick up their ass? Not youR FAMILY OHMYGOD I CAN’T EVEN ERASE THAT I’M WRITING IN PEN I MEANT THE GALRA!! THE GALRA IN GENERAL!! NOT THAT YOU HaVE a stick up your ass or hmm you used to but you know what?? Nevermind I’m going to stop. _

_ The team’s doing well. Pidge, Hunk, and I are still a solid trio. We don’t want to be part of the missions anymore, we’re just willing to learn more about making these ships and all. Matt graduated the Garrison. He’s still working for them, just not at the institution we’re at. Shiro’s went up in the ranks at the Garrison, but he isn’t doing much. Just some teaching. We all attend therapy but most of us don’t need as much time as Shiro does. Especially with what he went through and all. I’m not entirely comfortable talking about the final battle. _

_ Are you? _

_ I mean, the end of the war, that’s good. It was good for the universe, yeah, but it was fucking terrible for us. When we came back and were questioned…we told them what we could. They found it a joke, and that made us feel like shit. You tell people who are pressing you for information the horrid truth and they don’t believe you because “there’s no way that could be possible.” _

_ We all went through hell. I wanted to talk about it with the team, not a therapist, to tell them how I felt about it, but no one else wanted to. I get that. It made me realize that maybe I didn’t want to talk about it either. It’s still a little soon. _

_ Anyways, I guess I’m writing you this letter to update you on Earth and the team. I know you want to know how Shiro is, or at least I think. Not completely sure how things went between you two. It must be fun out there, not having me bother you constantly haha. If you want to send a letter back, you’ll have to get to my paper airplane-like machine. All you have to do is insert  _ _ 31.9686° N, 99.9018° W in the number pad under the left wing, and a little pocket will open up. It’s only small enough for paper, so don’t try to put a whole knife in there or somethin’. Proceed outside to close the device, and it’ll go flying right away. Those are the coordinates of the Garrison. It’ll land in a place only I know, don’t worry. _

_ We miss you, samurai. _

_ Hurry the fuck up, please, _

_ Cool Ninja Sharpshooter Lance _

******

For once, Keith isn’t up at night because of nightmares. No, instead, he’s up over a letter.

It was a relief looking at that handwriting. It meant it wasn’t any official corporation, it wasn’t the Garrison coming out to collect him or something, no. It was  _ Lance. _

He smiled so much reading the letter. He read it over and over, his heart warming up at the thought of his friends doing well. That they got help and are studying. To read the trouble Lance went through just to send him the letter…it made him feel good.

Keith and Lance were always very different. Lance had created some rivalry he never understood and tried to make it run for as long as possible.

That all changed when they got launched into space. They had to be a team, they had to work together. And they were good.

They were  _ amazing  _ together.

It didn’t take long for them to trust each other. They relied on each other, despite how opposite they were. It only got better from there.

Lance always found himself coming to Keith with his concerns. They were valid, according to Lance, but Keith found them degrading. Degrading  _ towards _ Lance. He put himself down all the time and Keith had to find the least awkward way to tell him that he’s valued in the team.

(He once told him to “leave the math for Pidge” and instantly regretted it after he saw the smile on Lance’s face.)

Keith always found himself being stabilized by Lance. At one time in his life, Keith was pilot of the black lion, and since he’s very, very impulsive and determined, he made a lot of rash decisions and executed them. It ended poorly, yeah, but Lance found a way to get him back on his feet and it worked  _ every time  _ since then.

That’s how Keith realized he had a crush on Lance.

_ Had _ . He  _ had.  _ Lance was always very oblivious. Keith tried his best not to show any romantic feelings for him in any way possible, but it was a little difficult when they spent every hour of every day standing next to each other. Keith was with Lance so much, he started copying his poses. 

Keith got over this crush. He’s 100% sure about it. There were moments his feelings returned, but he suppressed them. Those feelings had the nerve to return every time his eyes  _ fell _ on the tall boy. Suppressing them was his only choice to control himself. There was so much going on around them, he didn’t have time to try and create something new between them. The lives of billions were at stake, and if Keith prioritized having a  _ boyfriend _ over any of that, he would never forgive himself. It wasn’t something he would do.

What helped him get over this crush was going to the Blade of Marmora. It gave him time to be away from Lance, to see how he can do alone without his right-hand man. He wanted to test how he could cope with himself, how he could connect with a whole new group of people. He wanted to see if he could get rid of his feelings for Lance and leave it at friendship.

Friendship was good.

Then team Voltron was in shambles, and he had to come back. The Shiro with them was  _ not  _ real. It was a clone, tracking their every movement and attacking them at precise moments for Zarkon. Keith had come back to the team to find Clone Shiro tied up in a chair, his back wide open and several wires coming out of it. Pidge was tweaking with machinery behind, and Hunk was looking inside the clone with Allura and Coran. Lance was crouching in front of it, glaring it dead in the eye. Keith will never forget the dried blood on his forehead, the black burn marks on his paladin armor. Lance was the first one to sense Keith’s presence, turning his head in his direction.

Keith saw he was tired. The dark bags under his eyes, his messier hair, the weakness of the smile he gave him. The light in his blue eyes were gone, drooping intensely.

“Shiro was a clone,” he remembers Lance sighing. “I killed him.”

Keith shudders. This is not the time to be thinking about that. He wants to reply to Lance. Answer his questions and tell him about Veldis. Tell him how the Blades are treating him, how the Galra are, everything he could possibly muster up.

Keith is going to write it in the morning. He’ll wake up when the sky is still night, not yet turned to the yellow that occurs before the blue.

_ “You know what? Think of a name for it.” _

He’ll have to look at the paper airplane-like thing before he can name it. When he writes the letter, he’ll leave an underline to fill in the name.

******

Keith is up and out of bed before the alarms. The sun hadn’t climbed over the distant hills, so he wrote his letter to Lance using the dim flashlight by his bed. He folded it as small as humanly possible so that it can fit in his pocket. Hopefully, he’ll be able to get to the messaging office before it closes and look at the paper airplane-like machine.

But first things first: Keith has to meet Kolivan.

He pops out into the empty hallway, ready in his suit. The white lights blind him for a couple ticks, but then he’s ready to get back into action. He walks toward the room, finding no one around him. He likes it when the building is empty. He’s never actually been outside of his room when everyone else is still asleep, but now he thinks he should do it more often. There’s barely any sound.

The door opens automatically, sliding up into the doorway, and Keith steps in. The screens light up, all three showing a thumbnail to security footage. The center one shows three Galra, two of them looking familiar from the footage shown yesterday, glaring at one another. They’re in a busy area, other pedestrians crossing in front of them. The left screen shows one Galra, suspiciously looking through two boxes. The right screen shows the morning line for breakfast.

Keith stands awkwardly, waiting for a signal. He sees a control panel in front of him, but he doesn’t know how to work it at all. It’s not like a lion, as far as he knows.

“Kolivan?” Keith speaks out. “Are you here?”

Silence.

Keith takes a couple steps forward, expecting Kolivan to show up. Maybe he should just wait for him. Yeah, that seems like the right thing to do.

He sits on the stairs of the platform, facing towards the door. The brightness of the screens heat up his back.

Was he here too early? He’s not even sure what time it is. Maybe he should have taken his time. He woke up nervous to do this, to lead a whole mission and disband some rebels. This was nothing compared to leading Voltron at one point in his life, but he still predicts he’s going to make terrible decisions.

Keith, thankfully, was not the black paladin for long. Clone Shiro managed to get the black lion to respond to him, meaning Keith could leave and work with the Blade of Marmora. When Keith returned, Lance’s calling was to the Black Lion, and team Voltron was unstoppable under his leadership. But Keith’s time as the black paladin was rough. They had a new enemy to face and he was  _ good _ . He managed to drag the whole team into a gas planet that messed with their sensors, and Keith fell for it. He put the whole team in jeopardy, and to top it off, they couldn’t even form Voltron.  _ All  _ under Keith’s leadership.

He starts doubting himself. He shouldn’t do this, there’s not even a  _ reality  _ where he doesn’t fuck this over. He throws his hood over his head and starts walking to the door. Kolivan will understand that he can’t do it. Even if he has all this faith in him to succeed, he  _ knows _ Keith, and Keith can’t do this. Keith doesn’t have faith in himself.

Maybe he’ll just go into the messaging office, name the device, and go on with his Marmora duties. He’ll go hand out breakfast, his  _ least _ favorite job. Yeah, that sounds like a good day. A good agenda.

Just as he reaches the exit, the door flies up, a large shadow looming over Keith’s figure. He sees the unmistakable shape of Kolivan’s ears and his gut drops. He was so close to escaping this, and now he has to face it.

“Where are you going?” Kolivan asks, entering the room as Keith moves aside. The door slides shut.

“I-I was going to go look for you,” Keith lies, clenching his fist before he begins to comfortingly move his thumb over his index finger. He quickly removes his hood off his head. “Thought I was here a little early…”

“It’s good to know you are early,” he says, making his way toward the control panel. “Did you look at the footage?”

“No.”

Kolivan turns back towards him, squinting his eyes. “Why not?”

“I don’t know how to work the panel.”

He motions Keith to join him. Keith shuffles nervously towards him, already feeling like a failure for not knowing how to work something that seems so basic.

The orange control panel stands before him, several little squares covering the board. They all look the same, just with different Galra characters below each. Keith can’t read Galra. He’s tried, and it’s too complicated for him. He’s tried learning three different languages because he was required to pass a language class to get into the Garrison, but he managed to fail two of those classes. The third class was American Sign Language, which he passed because he thought his gloved hands looked cool when signing, therefore he practiced more often. He only remembers the alphabet now.

Kolivan presses his palm against the middle square, lighting up the board. He presses a button somewhere on top of it and the center screen footage begins to play. 

“If you looked at the thumbnail, you would know that two of the Galra against the wall were from yesterday’s security footage,” he mentions, viewing the video with intent. “Every morning, there’s going to be new footage and information insiders have been able to obtain. You’ll be the one investigating and using what you can to find out more about the rebel group.”

The three Galra give nervous glances at one another. The one on the left nods to the other two, then walks into the moving crowd and blends in perfectly. The Galra who was previously in the middle walks up toward someone in the corner of the screen, who is checking their bag of recently obtained materials. They take the bag from out of the screen, hand it back, and walk toward the other Galra in question. He passes him a clutch bag, and they both walk off screen.

“This was taken yesterday morning,” Kolivan mentions, rewinding the video and slowing it down. Keith watches with nervous eyes.

“What was in the bag of materials?” Keith asks, watching it all play out again.

“Not a clutch bag,” Kolivan answers. “Yesterday there were only seeds and fabric. I don’t know what a rebel group could do with that.”

_ Oh, but Keith’s supposed to figure that out, huh. _

“Have you identified them?”

Keith turns to look at him and sees a smirk come across his face. “I’ll teach you how to do that.”

Keith watches Kolivan’s fingers move across the panel. His hand pinches the center square, zooming in. He then places one finger to it and drags it towards the corner. The frame slides up towards one Galra’s face.

Kolivan looks at him. “You got that?”

Keith blinks. “Got what?”

“How to zoom into the footage.”

“Oh, uh, yeah. Yeah, pinch the screen, then you drag your finger around the big pad. Got it.”

Kolivan nods, then taps his finger three times on the big center pad. A frame appears around the Galra from yesterday’s footage. Another window opens up next to it, going through thousands of photos, trying to match the face. Keith stares, waiting patiently for a result.

After a few more ticks, a name appears along with a photo. There’s more information, but Keith can’t read it.

“Do you know Galran?” Kolivan asks.

“No,” he answers. “Please don’t expect me to learn it.”

“You have to learn it.”

“I’m not going to.”

Kolivan glares at him. “I’m not going to be here to translate it for you all the time.”

“And I’m not going to be able to learn the Galran language in two hours.”

“Two  _ vargas. _ You should have started learning when you accepted to be part of the Veldis Task.”

Keith narrows his eyes up at Kolivan, who is reading the information of the suspect. Keith didn’t expect to be here for so long. He’s been doing the same thing for  _ six months _ . Why should he have to learn the  _ language?  _ He’ll just write the information down in English. Keith takes out his tiny notebook and a pen.

“Morfran Enol, male, age thirty-two. Was a Galra pilot under Zarkon’s rule. Lives in the Eastern Precinct.” 

Morfran Enol has one defining feature: a stray, white piece of curly hair that rests on his forehead. Keith has never seen any semblance to curly hair on a Galra. Morfran’s ears stick out on the sides. He has dark purple skin and a red spike on his chin. His eyes are oval-shaped and he doesn’t have any eyebrows. 

Kolivan presses and holds the big center screen, then drags the frame over to a different Galra. He taps three times, and results come up faster than before. “Nedra Vual, female, age twenty-eight. Was a Galra soldier on planet Balmera. Lives in the Eastern Precinct.” 

Nedra Vual styles a dark purple buzz cut quite well, contrasting with her pale lavender skin. Her eyes are more circular and she has thick, defining brows.

Kolivan repeats the action for the last face in question, and it takes about a tick for results. “Bruns Anool, male, age forty-five. Was a high commander for Zarkon. Lives in the Eastern Precinct.”

The first thing that catches Keith’s eyes is his grey skin. He’s seen grey Galras a few times, but it was always on the toddlers. He’s been told they come into their lavender skin after a few years, but none of them hardly ever keep their grey skin. Bruns doesn’t have any hair, but does have furry ears. He has three evenly spaced-out thick purple lines running from the back of his head to his jaw.

Kolivan looks at Keith and backs away from the panel. “I’ll be back here translating. Everything else is up to you.”

Keith’s eyes widen as Kolivan walks off the platform. That’s how it’s going to be then. Kolivan is going to be here to translate. That’s all the spoon-feeding he’s going to get. Translation and information Keith isn’t allowed to look for, but can receive. He’s going to have to go out observing them, try to get his own intel —he’s  _ so _ limited. 

Keith sighs and puts away his notebook. His hand hovers over the panel. He needs to play the video on the other two screens, but he’s too nervous to ask how to get to them.

“Press the button to the left or right of the center pad to play the other videos,” Kolivan says from the back of the room.

Keith shrinks in on himself. Too obvious. He can’t look so dumb in front of Kolivan.

Keith throws his hood over his head like a shield and plays the footage.

******

Keith managed to get a lot of information. It was mainly face ID, but that’s a big step. Tomorrow he plans on looking for those identified during the day.

But he has something more important to do, now that the sky is going from purple to night. He has a letter to deliver back to Earth. Back to  _ Lance. _

All of the Blades are going to bed as he makes his way to the messaging office. He likes it when everyone makes their way back to their rooms because it officially marks the end of the day for him. He can rest.

Right when he enters, he sees the messenger from the night before at the front desk. He takes off his mask so she can recognize him. She looks up and smiles, getting out of her seat and going towards the back of the room.

Her hair is in a high ponytail today, several loose strands fluttering around her neck. Her hair sways from side to side as she moves.

“How was your meeting in the morning?” she asks, shuffling through some boxes. Keith places his elbows on the bar counter, watching her look for that paper airplane-like device.

“Tiring,” he sighs. “And scary. Kolivan scares the shit out of me.”

She laughs. “I get nervous every time he needs to speak to me. He’s a force to be reckoned with.” She comes walking back towards him, a small paper airplane-like device in her hands.

Keith stares as it comes his way. It’s red with white linings at the edges. It’s pointy and long, its wingspan shorter than two inches.

He fumbles for the letter he’s kept in his pocket all day. She places the device on the counter, ogling it. “Was the envelope important?” she asks, her hands cupping her face as she leans.

“Uh, in regards to the Blade of Marmora?” he asks, flattening out the piece of paper as much as possible. “No, not at all.”

“Then what was it?”

He doesn’t realize he’s smiling a little bit. “A letter.”

She furrows her brows. “A letter? A written one? Is Earth not as advanced as us or something?”

“Yes and no. They’re advanced, but not to the point where they can reach Veldis.”

“Then how did this”—she pokes the device—“get here?”

He smirks at her. “My friend is smart.”

Keith looks under the device, not sure if Lance meant from  _ his _ left, or the device’s left. He finds a pad of numbers, a button indicated by the shape of a circle, and the letters N, S, W, and E.

“What should I name it?” he asks her.

“You have to name it?” she asks back.

“Well, he wants me to. I’m not sure what I’d name it though.” He runs his finger across the wings. Lance’s workmanship has definitely improved since he last saw him. He must have learned a lot on his own to make something so advanced, and in such little time too. “Any ideas?”

“Hm...Viator. It means traveler.”

Keith smiles. “I think he’d like that.” He opens up the letter fully, looking for the blank space he created. “Do you have something to write with?”

She opens a drawer and passes him a pen. He fills in the blank space he left, writing in “Viator” as neatly as possible. He proceeds to fold the letter back in.

“So what do you input?” she asks, looking under the wing. “On the little buttons?”

“Coordinates,” Keith answers. He puts in the numbers and directions, the pad facing him, and the Viator splits open in the middle. He copies the coordinates into the little notebook in his pocket, just in case. Nervously, he places his letter inside the device. “Thanks for everything….” He looks at the name tag on her suit, failing to read it because it’s in Galran.

“You can’t read Galra?” she laughs. Keith gives her a deadpan look. “It’s Sigrun.”

“Thanks for everything, Sigrun,” he finishes. He walks outside, holding Viator under his arm carefully. Few Blades are still outside, but all are heading to their room. Keith decides to do the same.

Once inside his room, he opens up his window. The sky is night and the stars are gorgeous. The breeze that hits him is too cold for his liking, so he sets a goal to do this quickly.

By pressing the two wings together, the device closes up. It heats up in his hands and flies out his window. He looks at it go, slowly tilting up and towards the starry night of Veldis.

Keith hopes Lance gets it.


	2. diablito

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> spanish is my first language and im latina

Lance leans back on his desk chair, twirling a pen in between his fingers. The computer screen in front of him loads, getting slower and slower the more he looks at it.

Lance had hacked the Garrison around three months ago, found the details he needed for his paper airplane-like device, and got to work. He found wingspan designs that could help him, length measurements, recommended materials—everything he needed.

But it left him thinking there was more. There had to be! Pidge had managed to hack in when she was, like, fourteen, and she found out that they had more information on her family than they released. It couldn’t have ended right there _. _ There just  _ had  _ to be more information. How he’ll get to it? He’s still got time to figure that out.

Now he’s trying again. He’s been wanting to hack in again after feeling that rush of rebellious joy the first time. Hack anything, really. Files, designs, classrooms. The first thing that popped on screen was the cafeteria, and if he could hack into the cafeteria system, then what else could he hack into?

It was a bad idea. The cafeteria has every student, staff, and teacher—past or present—logged into their system. Having to get through all of it, on his computer that he hasn’t been able to change for three years, was a reach. Lance should have thought this through.

He whips out his phone and looks through his contacts. There’s Pidge, who’s always good at holding a conversation with him. Unfortunately, she’ll recognize that he’s up to something, because that’s really the only reason he even calls her. Is she even here? She might be visiting Matt, or back at home. She doesn’t live far from the Garrison but she won’t leave her house, or interact with people, just for Lance.

Hunk didn’t go home. He could call Hunk, ask him how his day was and all. He wouldn’t be so suspicious. Lance likes to talk to Hunk often because he’s really good at listening and is genuinely interested in what he has to say.

He’s gonna call Hunk.

Hunk’s on speed dial. Number 2, as Coran used to call him. The line rings and Lance rests his feet on top of his desk. He taps his finger impatiently on his knee, waiting and waiting until—

“Lance!” he hears Hunk’s cheerful voice on the other line.

“Hey!” Lance cheers back, sitting up in his chair. “Are you busy?”

“Uh, well, a little bit.” Hunk’s voice volume lowers.

“Oh.” Lance is disappointed. “What are you doing?”

“I’m at the Garrison up north. I’m visiting Matt with Pidge.”

Lance frowns and bites the inside of his cheek. “Oh, that’s alright.”

“Did you need something?”

“Ah, no, it’s not important. Don’t worry about it. Thanks bro.”

Lance hangs up before Hunk can say anything else. He shouldn’t be surprised, or disappointed, really. Matt, Pidge, and Hunk are their own group.

And they have been. About 70% of the time on the castle, the whole team would be hanging out together. The other 30% consists of them separated. It used to be, when Hunk was with Pidge, Lance would either join them or he’d be with Keith. He was usually with Keith, though. Shiro would usually be with Allura and Coran. It all worked out! No one was alone.

But then Keith left the team, and Matt came in. They met, yeah, and they were  _ acquaintances _ , but they were far from being part of the same group _. _ Matt and Lance just didn’t connect. It was obvious to everyone that something about them didn’t work out. They seemed similar, and they definitely had the potential to be friends, but they weren’t. Lance blames himself for that.

Once Keith left, Lance was pretty lonely. It hurt to admit it to himself, because Lance always saw himself as a social butterfly and it was easy for him to connect with others. Matt had taken over Lance’s rightful place in the Garrison squad. Matt coming to team Voltron, even if he wasn’t a paladin, felt like he was replacing Keith. They got rid of Keith and brought Matt in, and Lance was supposed to accept it easily because everyone else did. He refused to do that, and that’s why he let that potential die.

That was selfish of Lance, yes, he knows. Matt is Pidge’s brother, he’s who she spent most of their time looking for, he’s  _ family. _ Matt wasn’t someone who they could just throw away. He had so much information, he was useful, and he was liked. Really liked, in fact, and he wasn’t as annoying. Wasn’t as annoying as  _ Lance. _

Maybe that’s why Hunk kind of left him for Matt and Pidge. It could have been Pidge with Matt, Shiro with Allura and Coran, and Hunk with Lance. Matt and Pidge were the ultimate tech team. Add in Hunk, and they became the mecha-mega-ultimate tech team. They spoke each other’s language. They were  _ definitely _ much more entertained with one another than with Lance.

That didn’t mean Hunk and Lance grew apart. Lance wasn’t  _ always  _ lonely, and he wasn’t going to be mad at Hunk for making new friends. Hunk and him still talked—they always went to each other first before anyone else. They weren’t going to stop being best friends so easily, no, nothing could tear apart a bond like theirs. Instead of growing apart, they took time away from each other. Hunk took a break with Lance and went to the Holt siblings. If Hunk’s argument was that Lance took a break with him and went to Keith, he’d completely understand. Hunk  _ knew _ Lance was awkward with Matt, and didn’t try to push a relationship Lance clearly didn’t want. In retrospect, Hunk was a little awkward with Keith too, but they were able to tackle that.

Lance didn’t want this friendship because he felt like he would be acknowledging Keith’s replacement. Matt being part of team Voltron was replacing Keith, Lance being friends with Matt meant replacing his friendship with Keith—at that time in the team, anything that Matt did, Keith could have done. All he saw was replacement, replacement, replacement.

Now, Matt and him are better. Less awkward, they can call each other friends, but they aren’t at a high level of friendship. They never hated each other—just weren’t close. Lance wasn’t going to be part of their tech group, he knew he wouldn’t be wanted as an addition to their group, and he’s accepted it. It’s taken months for him to accept it, but he’s done it.

Lance puts his phone deep in his pocket. So he’s alone at the Garrison, waiting for his computer to hack into the cafeteria system. There’s gotta be  _ something _ he can do to pass the time.

_ Ha. _ Then it hits him.

Grabbing his keys, he heads out the door, a smile on his face.

******

Lance’s eyes peek over the bottom of the windowsill to room 610. The students at the back of the class slowly doze off, the one closest to the window blinking repeatedly so that he doesn’t go to sleep. Lance snickers—he loves Shiro, really, but he would  _ hate _ to be a kid in his class. Four years ago, he’d be  _ honored _ to be his student. He was honored to simply shake his hand the first time they met. But after a year and a half in space, he stopped putting him on a pedestal. Shiro was still a role model, but he was family now, more than anything.

Space really changed things for them. As a team, as individuals, they were completely new people when they got back to Earth.

But Shiro had the most dramatic change. He had already seen things when he came back to Earth the first time, only to get launched back into space and experience even  _ worse  _ events. He was a hero until he was captured, tortured,  _ replaced. _

Shiro unlocked the black lion’s ability to teleport, which was amazing! The black lion is the strongest overall, so to have unlocked an ability was a feat within itself. Yet that fight with Zarkon, the battle for control of the lion, it was the first domino that fell. Shiro disappeared. Zarkon had control of the lion for  _ two  _ ticks, and Shiro disappears.

Lots happened to Shiro.  _ Too  _ much, and it’s difficult for Lance to even think about. Shiro only told them the gist of what happened—he was gone for too long to give all the excruciating details to the team.

Zarkon managed to have the black lion transport Shiro directly to him. Zarkon had so much power over the lion that he got her to do what he wanted. Now he had a member of Voltron, the member who had the power he only wish he obtained  _ permanently, _ in his purple hands. Shiro faced the prison life again, but ten times worse than before. Galra soldiers were excited to see him come back to the ring again, excited to see their  _ gladiator _ once more.

Zarkon and Haggard took advantage of this. First, they made a clone of Shiro. Made him as human as possible. Called him _Kuron._ _Kuron_ had cameras for eyes. _Kuron_ had Shiro’s memories. As a method of torture, they’d tied Shiro down and put needles and wires in his head to get memories for the machine. They’d show him footage straight from Kuron’s eyes, footage of him _tricking_ his team, disobeying and not listening to them. He wasn’t a _leader._ He was a dictator.

Then there was his arm. A weapon, but one Shiro could control. Now the Galra had Shiro back, and there was more that they could do with that arm. Their gladiator had returned, after all. Why not make him stronger in the field?

His arm became a killing machine. You couldn’t be closer than a foot to Shiro because his hand would react and  _ burn _ you. Shiro couldn’t control his arm, or his hand, no—it had a mind of its own. Shiro, a human, had a full fucking  _ arm _ of artificial intelligence. And it ruined him. Shiro couldn’t make contact with anybody for months without hurting them.

Lance remembers when they had first found Shiro. He was roaming the Galra prison ship with Pidge, who had just found her dad a few minutes before. Samuel, this time, was with the group of prisoners they had saved. Pidge was mature enough to relish the moment, but continue doing her job as a paladin, and fulfill her duty to find Shiro.

Shiro was in his own cell, tied down by chains and hung up on the wall like a painting. Lance approached him, tears surfacing. The bags under his eyes were as dark as the prison ship halls. His hair swooped in front of his face, longer than he’d ever seen it. It was Shiro, but it wasn’t the one  _ he  _ knew. It wasn’t the one he respected, the one who cared for their team, it wasn’t his  _ friend. _ That hurt to see more than anything.

That’s when it had happened. Shiro’s hand lit, waking him up, and the chain began to sizzle. Lance had quickly looked at Shiro’s face for an answer, but all he saw were wide, bloodshot eyes. Shiro recognized him and  _ screamed _ at him to get away as quick as possible. Lance backed up, watching the chain break in half. Shiro started yelling at them to get out of the cell, to wait just a few minutes, that he’ll be out in a second. Grabbing the Holt’s hands, he lead them out, observing Shiro’s Galra hand melt off the remaining chain around his other wrist. The door shut behind them. A few ticks passed by, each of them looking patiently, and then a  _ bang _ was heard and a jutting dent appeared through the metal. The three of them jumped back in surprise at the sound and force. Samuel had asked aloud if Shiro was alright, and his response, through sobs, was to give him at least five feet. The door opened, the three of them giving him the five feet he asked for. He held his Galra hand tightly to his chest, pursing his lips. A tear fell from his face to the ground. His hand had made that dent, his hand was ready to finish attacking until there was no immediate threat.

“Don’t worry about me,” Shiro had said, giving a weak smile. After  _ months,  _ they see each other for the first time, and he can’t even get near him. He can’t even give them a genuine  _ smile.  _ “Just lead the way.”

Lance watches Shiro write on the board. He suppresses a laugh—he is terribly old-fashioned. The Garrison managed to remove his Galra arm safely, giving him a prosthetic instead. He got used to it quickly, which was amazing. Shiro learned everything so quickly. 

Maybe that’s why he writes on the board. Shiro loves his prosthetic, for it isn’t dangerous and won’t burn anyone. He loves using it as much as possible, and since he never really became left-dominant, he uses his new fingers to hold a marker up to the board and  _ write. _ Write and write and write.

His gray Garrison suit always fitted him so well. Among everyone else in the building, Shiro stood out when wearing that. He manages to look professional and royal, while still having a teacher vibe. His white fluff of hair even looked incredible, despite it all being a product of extreme stress. Shiro’s just an attractive person, no matter what changes are made to him.

The bells ring over the loudspeaker, signaling that class is over. Lance watches the students jump out their seats, filing out the door like soldiers. He gets up and waits for them to empty out, then proceeds to enter.

The classroom has a beautiful natural light to it that fills in the light gray walls. Shiro has never even touched the light switch since he got the room. His desk rests in front of the board, stacks of paper covering it and folders with sheets sticking out of them. The only organized thing on them are two colored highlighters, a red pen, and a mechanical pencil, all neatly laid next to each other. The student desks are all singular and face towards the board. He has desks all the way down to the end of the room, where the back of the chair is right up against the wall.

“You distracted my students, Lance,” Shiro laughs as he erases the board.

“Hello to you too,” Lance greets sarcastically, crossing his arms and sitting on top of a student desk. “How do you know I distracted them?”

“After class, the one who sits next to the window told me, ‘Lance is looking through the window and laughed at me.’ You are  _ not  _ sneaky.”

Lance slants his eyes as Shiro turns back towards him, a big ole grin on his face. “How dare that kid oust me again?”

“Because every time you decide to eavesdrop, he catches you laughing at him.”

“Still a dick move!” Lance exclaims, throwing his arms up over his head.

Shiro laughs and sits on his chair. He slides the stationary over to his right and begins to organize the papers on his desk. “So, what’s with you? Looks like you’ve been in your room all day.”

“I have nothing to do,” Lance sighs, “and Hunk is out with Pidge. And I  _ have _ been in my room all day, but I changed and looked presentable for you.”

“Did they go visit Matt?”

Lance nods his head.

“Why didn’t you go with them?” He puts his papers down and places his chin in his hand. “You’re friends with Matt.”

“ _ You’re _ friends with Matt too. They also didn’t tell me about it and I’m not  _ that _ good of friends with Matt.”

“You two are good friends. He wouldn’t be upset if you went to visit him.”

“Well, Hunk and Pidge didn’t tell me they went up north, so it doesn’t even matter,” Lance spats. Shiro gives him a look, one that tells him he  _ knows _ Lance is at least a little mad, then looks away, nodding his head in understandment. “Besides, I’ve got something to do in a bit.”

“Then what are you doing here?”

“Hey, I haven’t seen you in a while!” he protests.

Shiro laughs genuinely, bringing a smile to Lance’s face. “I’m kidding, I’m kidding, Lance. Do you want to help me grade some papers?”

“Do you have an answer sheet?” he asks, jumping from his place and looking at the papers blanketing the desk. “Because last time I helped I had to check their math work and wanted to ditch you.”

“Of course I do.” Shiro hands him a stack of papers and a red pen. “Last time was the first test I had them take and was just testing the waters.”

“Test failed.”

“I was  _ new. _ ”

Lance smirks. “How many am I to grade?”

“However many you can until five o’clock.”

Lance searches for a clock in the room, finding one at the end of the class. It reads two o’clock. He takes a seat in one of the student’s desks and gets to work.

He likes having one-on-one time with Shiro. It makes up for the times he couldn’t have with him in space. Shiro’s the only family he has with him at this very moment anyways.

“How’s your niece, Lance?” Shiro wonders.

“Irene’s great!” Lance  _ loves _ talking about his niece. He loves talking about his family, but if he had to choose a favorite to talk about, it would be niece. She’s such a pure soul. Shiro met her once, when Lance was facetiming her a couple months ago. She said his scar looked cool, and since then, Shiro’s liked her. “I last went home, like, four months ago. Her birthday was two weeks ago. She’s four now.”

“Did she have a party?”

“Yeah.” Lance grins. “You want to know what I did with her instead?”

Shiro nods his head as he grades away.

“We had a mini spa day!” Lance throws his hands in the air. He had been planning this for  _ months. _ “I painted her nails, bought some face masks, and got some candy. She was so excited! We watched movies all day and my sister was a little mad because I did her brows but we had fun.” He crosses his arms across his chest, smiling devilishly. “I believe  _ I  _ win at being the best uncle.”

Shiro rolls his eyes. “You are, indeed, the best uncle, Lance.”

******

Lance was having a mini crisis when he was grading papers with Shiro. He had taken a small break at three and gotten coffee for the two of them. When he came back into the room, he looked out the window and almost dropped the cups in his hand.

His plane. His little paper airplane-like thing had flown past, heading towards its landing spot.

Keith got the letter. Keith got  _ his _ letter, the one he worked so hard to simply get sent. It was a success! And it returning...Keith had written  _ back! _

Lance  _ begged _ Shiro for him to let him go early. He went on his knees and whined, but Shiro wouldn’t budge. He was confused, not sure why he wanted to leave so early, but he wouldn’t let him.

Lance zoomed out of Shiro’s class right when the big hand landed on the five. He thanked him and ran down the halls, the sound of his feet against the floor echoing, getting some sneers from classmates, but not minding too much. He had to get to his device, he had to get to the letter, he had to know how Keith was doing.

Six months away from his space cowboy was  _ so  _ long. So agonizing. The moment everything in space was over, when all was at last tranquil, Lance was  _ so _ looking forward to having Keith back at the Garrison. Maybe he could help him get back on track, make him part of their team, literally  _ anything.  _ Lance needed Keith. He was so easy to talk to, sometimes more so than Hunk, and being away from him has always had a toll on Lance. He had so much trust in him, it was a little ridiculous. He was able to talk to him about his insecurities and he could calm Keith down when necessary.

Keith was fun to have around. He could play tricks on him, make fun of him, but it was all out of love. Keith also would make fun of him, give him snazzy comebacks, all out of love. They were the best partners. When together, nothing could tear them apart. They became masters at whatever was put in front of them. Their dynamic was something that you couldn’t find anywhere else on team Voltron. 

They were a good team.

Hell, imagine them together? On Earth? They’d have so much time to themselves. They’d have time to learn more about each other without several purple assholes attacking them. They could train for flying Garrison ships, not fighting soldiers. They’d be in uniform, not armor. They’d be on a ship because they  _ wanted _ to, not because they lived there.

Lance would love to introduce his niece to Keith. She’d love braiding that mullet versus the small, thin strands of hair on Lance’s head. Keith would most likely be terrified of even being near her, but he’d soften up quick. Keith was able to give a  _ hug _ to the Arusians, therefore he could handle a little four year old. She also wouldn’t have a weapon on her, hopefully. She’s probably more capable of making something her weapon than Keith is.

Lance could help Keith find his family. It’s something he’s been meaning to do. He said he’d start looking once they got back to Earth. Lance could help him! Hacking into a system other than the Garrison would be a fun challenge.

But Keith wasn’t on Earth. Not yet, and Lance won’t know for how long. When Keith was recruited to the Veldis Task, the Blade of Marmora told the team he wouldn’t be gone for long. They’d send him to Earth as soon as possible.

Well, they were wrong! Lance was  _ angry _ that they were  _ wrong! _ “Wouldn’t be gone for long” his  _ ass. _ “Not long” is a couple of days, not  _ half a year!  _ He didn’t even like seeing the Blades after the war was done, and for them to approach Keith? After everything they did to him? Bullshit. It was  _ fucking bullshit. _

Here’s what the Blades did to Keith, according to Lance: they tore him to shreds. In team Voltron, they valued life. They cared for one another, they were family and nothing would stand in the way of them saving one another. The Blade of Marmora saw their life meaningless compared to the cause. They gave their life up so that they could  _ possibly _ defeat Zarkon, and good for them! That was  _ their _ doctrine,  _ not _ Voltron’s, and  _ not  _ the one Keith grew up with. Keith tried to save so many of the Blades, because they became his family too, and he was ridiculed for it. He was lectured for risking his own life to save someone else’s, he argued with Kolivan over what constituted a reason to die and live, and suddenly, everything the Blades did became something he found worthy of doing. It was honorable to die for a cause. His life was meaningless compared to the universal good.

That’s what made Lance so angry. When Keith decided he was going to die just so Voltron could live, he scared the whole team, but traumatized Lance. He found out through Matt, the one person he would hate to find out through, what Keith tried to do. Lance could never forget the feeling of his heart dropping, how difficult it was for his legs to stand. Lance had ran to his room, frantically calling the Blades and Keith. There was no answer at all. Lance threw his phone, screaming into his pillow because his  _ best friend could not have done that. _ Keith, though he’s for fighting Zarkon and all, would  _ not _ do something like that. It’s what the Blade of Marmora would do, not  _ Keith. _

Keith was a shield, but never a weapon. Keith was ready to protect himself, protect others, maybe even threaten if necessary, but  _ never _ kill. The Blade of Marmora were opposite. They were ready to kill, and ready to die. Keith was not. Keith had been in the Blade of Marmora for such a short time, yet he, at his young age, was ready to give up everything the members, who had been a part of the team for thousands of years, were ready to.

He saw Keith a week later and shoved him against a wall, yelling at the top of his lungs how stupid he was, how irrational his train of thought was, how he didn’t think of the  _ team. _ He let team Voltron leave his mind, maybe because he thought his death would slip by like it would have in the Blade of Marmora, but  _ not _ in their little family: Keith had yelled back, saying his life was miniscule compared to the mission, and that the team shouldn’t even matter about him so much, because he wasn’t a paladin anymore.

They continued screaming at each other, and no one bothered to rip them apart. Instead, they left, which he later found out they did because it seemed like something they needed to work out by themselves. The team were all thankful he was alive, but they weren’t angry—not like Lance. The minutes passed by, their ear drums beating louder the more their voices raised, and soon enough Keith was sobbing. He let his forehead rest on Lance’s shoulder, his hands falling at his sides. His tears made Lance cry, and then he just rubbed his back comfortingly. They called each other names, threatened one another, pointed out the flaws that they didn’t need to be reminded of, and there they were together, letting their anger fade to vulnerability. No one could do that like them—they had a connection everyone wish they had. The connection was built off of opening up to one another and months of trust.

That’s what Lance has been missing for half a year.

Lance pushes the door out of the Garrison, running into the hot desert night. The sand flies behind him, already getting stuck between his socks and the back of his shoes. He pants loudly, wishing he exercised more than what he does walking down the hall to his next class.

Ahead of him are the brown rocky cliffs that surround the Garrison. The orange sun set makes the horizon line shine brighter. The humid summer air is sticky against his skin and the temperature makes him sweat. Lance tries his best to avoid looking at the sun as he looks for the little tunnel he found for the device to land.

He sees the small cave in the the distance, and inside, a little glint of metallic red. He smiles from ear to ear and runs faster and faster and faster, until he reaches the location and falls to his knees. He laughs seeing it, overcome with joy that it even managed to get  _ back. _ It’s in perfect condition, a little dusty from the landing, but nonetheless, just like he had left it.

He picks it up, hugging it to his chest and hollering cheers. He kicks his feet up in the air as he falls back, dust placing itself between his brown locks.

He sent this thing around a month ago. He isn’t exactly sure how long it takes for it to get to and from Earth to Veldis or how long it had taken to get to Keith. This was going to take some investigating.

Lance is gonna open it in his dorm, alone and content with reading mail from his best friend. He’s up on his feet after making that decision, running back before anyone can catch him. It’s the weekend, and curfew is extended anyways, but everyone at the Garrison doesn’t really trust him. If he’s only  _ barely _ making it to his room before curfew, then something fishy is up according to them.

He hides the device under his jacket when he gets past the doors, walking normally through the halls. Lance digs in his pockets for his keys, taking out the device once he’s in the safe-zone that is the dorm hallways. Everytime he looks at the red-lined device, a smile comes to his face. He can’t  _ wait _ to read Keith’s letter. Hopefully it’s long and tells him everything that’s happened to him since they left space. He hopes he’s doing fine, and that the Blade of Marmora aren’t such dicks anymore. Maybe Keith misses Earth. Misses the team. Misses Lance. He prays silently that the paper inside the device doesn’t have a singular sentence on it, because that’s something Keith would definitely do. Keith better had taken this seriously, since Lance went through so much trouble. He wants to talk to Keith like they used to, even if it has to be through writing.

Lance knows he’s getting closer to his room, so he looks up ahead to make sure he doesn’t miss it.

A lonely figure stands in front of his door, knocking a little frantically. The figure is small, a little round in size, and holds a big basket in their hand. A bun sits at the top of their head, bobbing a little bit every time their fist hits his door.

The figure looks to the side, the light hitting their face. Her brown hair reflects almost yellow, like the color of the dress she wears. She’s welcoming, as always. Lance’s eyes go wide, almost dropping the device in his hand. “Mom?”

She smiles wide, her blue eyes gleaming at the site of him. “Surprise Lancito!” she greets. “Happy early birth…” Her eyes fall on the rest of her son—white shirt covered in brown dust, hair disheveled, his brand new jeans dirty, and his shoes a whole new color. Her eyebrow raises, curious as to her son’s new look. “What happened?”

Lance looks down at himself, not expecting to be as filthy as his mom made it seem. She’s right, of course. “I was outside,” he says quickly.

His mother crosses her arms over her chest, smirking and bobbing her head towards him. “And what’s that?  _ En tú mano? _ ”

Lance looks at the device in his hand, cursing himself in his head. His mom was the one who was always into astronomy, got him interested in space and adventuring it, helped him achieve his dream of getting into the Garrison. She’s been up to date with the administration since she learned English, therefore she knows of all the space shuttles, all of the little robots— _ everything.  _ She definitely knows more about the Garrison than Lance does, and he’s a student there.

Therefore, she’d recognize something out of the blue. Lance made a whole new design for the device in his hands, nothing the Garrison has ever made in their decades of business, and wanted to keep it as a secret. Well, he already blew it.

Lance hides it behind his back, going up against the wall and making small steps towards his door. He grins at his mother, whose eyes get narrower and narrower as he slowly approaches her. “Nothing!” he lies through his teeth. “What are you doing here?”

“I haven’t seen you in some time  _ hijo, _ ” she says, emphasizing each word a little with a lean forward, “ _ pero _ now I want to know what you’re hiding from your  _ madre _ .”

“Nothing! I’m hiding nothing, Mom.” He stays pinned to the wall as he reaches his hand over to the knob, jamming the key in and opening it up. He presents his dorm to his mom with his hand. “Ladies first,” he smiles.

His mom gives him a fake smile back. “Can you hold this Lance?” she asks, putting the heavy woven basket covered with a kitchen rag in front of him. He grabs it with his free hand, his cheeks hurting the more he keeps up this facade. “And my purse, hold that too please?” She takes her purse off her shoulder and holds it in the air, waiting for him to grab it.

Lance glares at her. He knows what she’s doing. “ _ No puedo, _ my hands are full.”

“ _ Si puedes, _ because you have  _ two _ hands, and I gave you  _ one _ thing to hold.”

“My other hand is busy.”

“Your other hand is behind your back. If you don’t grab my purse, then I’m going to head back home.”

Lance’s arm weighs down. “Mom, what is  _ in _ this basket? It’s so heavy,” he whines.

“I was gonna make you dinner,” she says, pulling the rag off from the top to reveal an array of ingredients. “ _ Ropa vieja. _ ”

Lance’s stomach growls at the name. His mom knows the way to his heart with her homey Cuban food.  _ Ropa vieja  _ is his absolute favorite—shredded meat drenched in sauce on top of his mom’s delicious rice. Just the thought of it makes him excited.

“ _ Entonces, Lancito, _ can you grab my purse?” she repeats.

Lance loves his mom. She doesn’t visit much, and he can’t visit too often either, because the drive from the Garrison to his home is ten hours long on a good day. On a bad day, it can stretch from twelve to fourteen. He loves when she brings home to him because he’s so deprived of it. He misses his family more than anything and only wants to have more time with them.

Lance is already busted, and he doesn’t want his mom to leave—he  _ knows _ she’s dead serious with her threats—so he caves in. Reluctantly, he takes his hand out from behind him, showcasing the workmanship that is his device. His mom’s eyes glitter when they lock onto it. She carefully takes it from him, her motherly gentleness coming through for a machine. She slips the strap of her purse into his palm and walks through the door, gliding her fingers on the white linings. Lance rolls his eyes, walking in right behind her and shutting the door with his foot.

******

The paper airplane-like device rests on the kitchen counter of his dorm, next to the basket of food and his mother’s purse. She sits on a stool, leaning forward as her eyes gleam at the machine. Lance sits next to her, watching her look at it like a newborn baby. He loves how his mom is fascinated by anything the Garrison releases, because usually he’s able to join her in her excitement, but this is different. He’s made it, and while Lance  _ loves _ showing off, he wanted this to remain a secret. This was going to be specifically between Lance and Keith and no one else. No one else should know about it, because they can go tell the Garrison, and that’d be the end of Lance. The Garrison would catch on to his hacking or something. There’d be a fully launched investigation.

But Lance can’t keep a secret from his mom. He either tells her, or she finds out eventually. So this came as no surprise—of course she would find out about this thing.

“You made it, didn’t you?” she inquires, looking at her son from the corner of her eyes. Lance nods, leaning back against the counter. “How?”

“I’m quite talented,  _ Mamá, _ ” he tells her, winking and giving her his signature grin.

She sits up, furrowing her brows. “How did you  _ make _ it, Lance Angél Sanchez Perez?” Her demanding tone has returned.

Lance gulps, the grin dropping from his face. He should have just answered. She used his  _ whole  _ name, meaning he’ll get into more trouble if he says something dumb. She knows her son too well. If Lance hadn’t given a snarky answer, then she wouldn’t have catched on to the fact that he’s hiding something else. What’s he going to tell her? He hacked into the Garrison, stole mail that had the materials he needed, and hid into the workroom at three in the morning to make his damn thing?

“ _ Lance. _ ”

“Haha, how’s everyone back at home?” Lance dodges, scratching the nape of his neck. He’s gotta find a way to avoid this. “Haven’t seen them in a while!”

“Your dad is working at the mechanic shop,  _ like always, _ Camila and Vicente got an apartment, so they moved out of my house _ , pero tus abuelitos  _ still live in our house, Irene’s favorite song is the ABC’s, Adrian is  _ really  _ happy that he finished the third grade, because he was tired of it, Ramón got promoted at his job and is now manager,  _ y  _ guess what?  _ Por fín van a tener un bebé— _ ”

“Ramón’s gonna be a dad?” Lance yells, jumping in his seat. “Since when! Why am I only figuring out  _ now? _ How long has Nicole been  _ preggos— _ ”

“—and Emilia’s gonna graduate a semester early.”

“WHAT!”

“Now, the  _ airplane? _ ” his mom asks again, pointing at the airplane, now that’s she’s wrapped up her summary on how the Sanchez family has been after dropping two bombs on him.

“No, no, no! Ramón? A dad?” Lance asks exasperated. His brother couldn’t even take care of him and his twin sisters properly when he was sixteen! Ramón, who is twenty one freakin’ years older than his baby brother, was too scared to hold Adrian when he was born because he’s  _ clumsy!  _ “H-How? And just  _ how _ tired of third grade was Adrian, and hasn’t Irene listened to the radio? Or watched that new kids movie with singing? Where does Camila live now? Also why is Emilia graduating a semester early—” __

“Nicole found out two weeks ago, Adrian just nagged about it all the time,  _ como voy a saber  _ if Irene’s watched the movie, Camila lives ten minutes away, and Emilia’s smart.”

“But—”

“ _ El avión, Lance! _ ” his mom yells, eyeing the airplane and making him back down.

“The Garrison let me!” he covers up, smiling at her concern. Asking anymore questions would be pointless, he realizes.

“ _ Malbado,  _ you’re going to lie to your own mom?” She points at herself, crossing her leg over the other. Her face is turning red and her eyes are slanted towards her son. “If the Garrison let you do it, they would have told me.”

“No they wouldn’t, it’s a secret thing they had me do.”

She scoffs, holding the device in her hands. “They don’t trust you enough for that, Lancito.”

Lance is kind of offended. “What makes you think that?”

She gives him a deadpan look. “You went into space and saved the universe from mass destruction by piloting lions and forming a robot with a big sword.”

“Yeah!”

“They don’t believe you  _ chiquito, _ ” she laughs, booping his nose. “I’m not going to tell anyone, Lance. You can trust me.” She places her hand comfortingly on his knee, smiling sincerely at him. Her smile always makes Lance melt a little. His mother is such a wonderful person and small gestures like this make him trust her all the more.

“I hacked into the Garrison,” Lance sighs, his back hunching forward as he admits it.

“You did  _ what! _ ” she yells, lightly hitting his knee with her hand. Her eyes are wider than he’s ever seen. “ _ ¿Estas loco? _ ”

“Hey, I’m not crazy!” Lance uses his hands to surrender.

“You can get kicked out for that!”

“Look, Mom,” he tries to reason, his hands slowly moving down, “hear me out, okay?”

“You hacked the Garrison to make a little  _ airplane? _ ” she asks, holding it closer to her son’s face. “What good is this for? Just a little experiment?”

“No! No, no, no,  _ Ma,  _ listen to me for thirty seconds. Please.” He twists in his stool, facing his concerned mother and holding her hand between his.

“Fine,” she whispers, looking between the device in her hand and Lance’s face.

“ _ Recuerdas  _ Keith?” he asks his mom.

“Yes, I remember that  _ diablito _ .”

He smiles. Of course she remembers the nickname. “Yes, well, that  _ diablito _ is still out in space, remember?”

She nods. Lance was glad his mother believed what happened to him and his friends out in space. Her reason was because there was no other way they would disappear for that long and return physically fine. She had accepted he was dead—there was no way her son would manage to get into space, completely unauthorized, and return fine. There was some collateral damage, yes, but they weren’t dead. Changed, but very much alive. 

“Well, with that device, I was able to communicate with him. I hacked into the Garrison for designs and measurements and worked on making it for some months.” His lips curl into a smile. “I also stole some materials, but nothing they’ll notice.”

Lance’s mom shakes her head, trying to suppress the smile threatening to come to her face. “Just like when you were little.”

“Anyways,” he continues, “I made a lot of prototypes, and this one was able to travel all the way to where Keith is. So, I wrote him a letter. I wasn’t expecting it to come back, but I saw it fly towards its location around four. I ran to go get it, which is why I’m _ dirty _ , because it’s dusty out there, and came back to my room so I can read it.”

Lance’s mom looks at him for some seconds, and then something hits her. Her mouth drops, her thin eyebrows arching up and her eyes gleaming with what he thinks is pride. She holds up the device higher. “This made it farther into space than the Garrison is able to go?” she realizes.

Lance nods, happy she’s valuing the accomplishment over the wrongs he’s committed. She gives him a bear hug, the wings of the machine creating a small little dent into his back. He wraps his arm around her waist, cherishing in the sweet scent of his mom.

“I’m so proud of you,” she whispers, sounding like she’s at the verge of tears, “my  _ Lancito. _ I know you miss Keith. I’m glad you can talk to him now.”

“ _ Gracias, _ ” Lance says into her shoulder. “But this is a secret, okay? No one knows about this. Not Hunk, not Pidge, not Shiro, no one, okay?”

She gently pushes him away, nods, and gets up, straightening her dandelion dress. “I’m going to start cooking.” She moves to the other side of the counter and starts taking out the food in the basket. Lance looks at the device on the counter, his hand shaking a little as he goes to grab it. He looks under the left wing and presses the silver button. The device splits in half, revealing a folded piece of paper with writing on both sides.

_ He wrote a lot. _ Lance feels the butterflies in his stomach come to life. He takes the paper between his thumb and index paper, glancing at the black ink against the white paper. The plane shuts closed.

“ _ ¿Vas a leer lo? _ ” his mom asks, giggling at his obvious nervousness. She takes out her tablet and fidgets with the apps until she’s gotten to her music and begins playing her  _ cumbia. _

Lance rolls his eyes. “I’ll read it, I just need a little time.”

“C’mon, just read what that  _ diablito _ said.”

“I’ll read what the  _ diablito _ wrote, just wait!” Lance gets up and paces back and forth to the music. He shouldn’t be this nervous about it. Maybe it’s his mom’s presence that’s making him this way? He doesn’t know. Maybe the Blade of Marmora  _ aren’t _ treating him well. Hell, what if Keith didn’t even get to it? What if a Blade did, and wrote back telling him that communication was forbidden? Worst case scenario, what if  _ Kolivan _ came across it?

“ _ Dios mio,  _ Lance. It’s not that serious.”

He whips his head towards her. She’s moving her hips to the music, humming along. “Yes it is!” His voice cracks.

She shakes her head as she chops away at the vegetables. “Lance, do you remember why you gave Keith the nickname  _ diablito? _ ”

Lance stops in his tracks. “I gave him that nickname, like, three years ago. Also, that’s only between you and me.”

“You gave him the nickname because of his red jacket and his temper. The  _ diablito _ was your rival, yes?”

Lance sulks and nods.

“And now you’re best friends. It’s a term of endearment. What does  _ diablito _ mean in Spanish, Lance?”

“Little devil,” he answers, finding his way back to the stool.

“Being the devil is bad, therefore calling some a devil would be rude, but you use it like a cute nickname, because…” His mom waits for an answer, taking a break from her chopping to look at him.

“Because it’s not that serious,” Lance finishes.

“Exactly! And it fits him in the best way possible, yes?”

Lance nods again.

“Then read the  _ pinche  _ letter, Lance.”

The sound of the knife against a placard returns. Lance opens up the paper, fingers shaking. Relief hits him upon the first line—it  _ was _ Keith.

_ To: Lance _

_ I wasn’t expecting this. A little paper airplane thing, out on Veldis, with a letter for me. _

_ Are you fucking insane? _

_ Outside communication is forbidden. I shouldn’t even be responding to your letter. I, technically, was never supposed to find it! The messaging office should have burned it at the stake. It only got to me because someone thought it’d be something from an important person, like the damn president or the Garrison, and I’m the only one here who knows how to read English. _

_ But here I am, so I might as well answer your burning questions, Lance. I wouldn’t have to if this didn’t come across my way, but it did, and here I am :) _

_ I appreciate everything you did to send me this letter. I never thought that you would turn into some crazy mathematician just to send me a piece of paper. Also, hacking into the Garrison? I’m pretty sure you’re, like, 100% crazy. I did some hacking back when I was in the shack, but that doesn’t excuse you to do it. You’re a good kid. I was not. Hope you found some meaningful stuff because I never did. _

_ Your first question: how is Veldis. Well Lance Veldis is.. interesting. It’s interesting. It’s, uh, you know what? Let me explain it to you. _

_ Veldis has plains and plains and plains of this grass-like thing. It’s kind of amazing. When we first got here that’s all there was—grass and some rivers down the way. Then, the Blade of Marmora got their stuff together, had many, many supplies made and, we finally brought over the Galra, officially beginning the Veldis Task. I don’t know where they were held before. Maybe they still used the ships from the empire to hold them, but I don’t know that information. They flew in on big ships and I was in the suit with my hood on, my mask activated, staring up at them from the ground. Thousands of Galra walked off these ships in shame, handcuffed. _

_ Funny, isn’t it? The Blades bring them to a different planet, where they can start anew, under their watch, and start with a bang by handcuffing them. _

_ But I digress. We started building and creating headquarters and living spaces and eventually, Veldis looked less like the fields of the open country, but more like a city center...with a grass-like thing around it and rivers some distance away. _

_ Members of the Blade of Marmora live in one of the three headquarters in the planet. I live in the one where the messaging office is, so that’s lucky on your part.  _

_ What I do here is quite simple: I wake up, I get dressed, and I do several different tasks depending on what they assign me. Sometimes I’m serving food for breakfast, sometimes I’m putting materials in bags, sometimes I’m building, really anything. _

_ It’s pretty routine, and very boring, but I have found a reason to like Veldis, though I’m stuck here. My favorite part about Veldis is the sky. It has five stages: Yellow, blue, gray, purple, and night. Those are the colors that the sky turns in a day’s length. The sun rises against a yellow sky, which then turns to a nice ocean blue. It stays like that for most of the day until sunset. Once the sun begins to go down, the sky turns grey. Think of the sky on Earth when it’s cold and it seems like it’s going to rain, but it doesn’t. Just the cold wind filling up your lungs—like that. When the sun’s about midway past the horizon, the sky turns purple. It doesn’t last too long but it’s nice nonetheless. From there, the sky turns a dark, navy blue, or what is more universally known as night. The stars come out and, damn it Lance, it’s fucking gorgeous. Nothing like seeing them in the city on Earth, or the amount of stars you see at the Garrison, or through a telescope, or through the gigantic windows of the castle, not even like what you see when sitting in your lion—no, it’s so different, and it’s  _ _ beautiful. _ _ I don’t even know how to put it into words. I’ve never seen so many stars? So peacefully? _

_ Does that make sense? _

_ Like, okay, on Earth you barely see them, especially in the city. There’s just so many lights and buildings and things to draw your eyes away from them. Also, there’s, like, three stars you can count, the other lights in the sky are just from airplanes. At the Garrison, the sky is clearer and all because it’s in the middle of nowhere, but there’s still not as many stars. You can count them and keep track. _

_ On the castle, and in the lion, stars were everywhere, but the atmosphere wasn’t the same. We were in the middle of a war—even the prettiest things don’t have the same effect. _

_ But here, in Veldis, I can sit in my room and look at them. I can go outside and lie down on that fake grass and immerse myself. I don’t have any worries. _

_ Just wanted an excuse to write to you about stars. _

_ The Blade of Marmora are doing fine. They’re taking charge and finally taking a break from what they’ve been doing for thousands of years. _

_ That’s it. _

_ The Galra are….compliant. Kinda have a stick up their ass. _

_ I haven’t had time to learn about the Galra culture, or my mom—too busy. Running a society is hard and by the time I’m back in my room I just want to sleep. I don’t know if they have traditions or something, if any of it stopped when Zarkon’s reign began, I don’t know. There’s no way for me to even gain that information. Maybe soon, but I’ll have to make friends or something. Kolivan isn’t going to tell me anything, he’s too reserved. The other members don’t tend to talk to me because, well, I’m different from them. Isn’t that ironic? I didn’t connect well with others on Earth because I was half Galra, and I don’t connect well with others on Veldis because I'm half human. Ha. _

_ Good to know how the team’s doing. No one can separate the Garrison trio, huh? Also, good for Matt! Crazy to think I might’ve been doing that too if I wasn’t kicked out. Me, graduating the Garrison. Hmmm. _

_ Shiro? A teacher? He’s like a brother and all but, wow, if I could barely sit through a two-minute lecture, imagine a two hour class? I would have voluntarily dropped out of the Garrison. I don’t know how Shiro and I are either. I want to fix our relationship. I’m not mad at him or anything, really. What he did was an accident and it wasn’t his fault. Tell him that. _

_ If you ever need to talk to someone, I’m here to listen. _

_ Well, read. I’m here to read. Maybe writing it out will help you instead. Helped me when I was little. I didn’t have anyone to talk to, so I’d write. Not exactly like a diary, but that’s kind of the concept. Point is, I’ll read it, you know. Even if it’s about the war and stuff. _

_ I don’t know if I’m comfortable talking about the war. I get nightmares about it often, but it has simmered down. No one’s ever really asked me to talk about it because everyone here lived through it. They’ll believe me and they’ll have their own experiences. Ours are similar, though how we dealt with it is different. I don’t know. I don’t think about it much because I have a lot of other things on my mind. But if I ever find myself needing to talk about it, I’ll write it out. Maybe to you. We’ll see how long this little airplane lasts. _

_ It’s almost the end of July there, right? Happy birthday Lance. We’re both twenty now. Not for long, for me, at least. _

_ Don’t know what to name this little airplane, because I lack creativity, but I’ll leave a little blank space for me to fill in before I send this back. _

_ Viator _ _ is what has been suggested. It means traveler. _

_ Hope you get this Lance, _

_ Keith _

******

“What’s the smile for?” his mom asks, looking over her shoulder at him as she cooks on the stove. “You look like a  _ chismoso. _ ”

Lance could care less.

If he wasn’t in front of his mom, little streams of happiness would be coming out of his eyes. Keith wrote him back, and he wrote him  _ a lot, _ and it actually got back to him! It felt so good, Lance felt  _ so good. _ He missed that mullet boy so much and now he could talk to him. He can find out how he’s doing, they can catch up, they can act like they  _ aren’t _ so far away.

To top it off, the letter was  _ so _ Keith! How to start off a letter, Keith style:  _ get angry and lecture! _ And then! Suddenly get really nice! And talk about stars! And draw a smiley face!  _ Keith Kogane drew a cute little smiley face! _ He wished him a happy birthday, even though it wasn’t for another two days.

Veldis sounds nice. Beautiful, actually. It sounds like a planet Lance would have enjoyed when he was in space. A good place to land his lion and stare at the sky change, sitting among  _ something _ that resembled Earth.

The Veldis Task seemed like it was doing fine, by Lance’s standards. They’d liberated planets but never had to really see it be built up again. Veldis was empty, and the only thing Lance feels he’s missing out on is seeing them rise up with the use of their technology. Besides that, Keith’s job is pretty wack.

It’s upsetting, knowing Keith hasn’t been able to find out what he wanted. One reason Keith took on the Veldis Task was to connect to his culture, to find his mom, and the fact that he has no time to do that? Even a bigger reason to hate the Blade of Marmora.

They just won’t let Keith do what he wants, no matter how long they have him under their sleeves. To top it off, they won’t even talk to him. It’s ridiculous.

_ “What he did was an accident and it wasn’t his fault. Tell him that.” _

How? How’s he gonna tell Shiro that? He hasn’t told  _ any _ of his friends that he managed to find a way to communicate with Keith.

And Lance has a good reason for that! And it’s valid, and maybe a little selfish, but definitely  _ valid. _

This was  _ Lance’s _ doing. No one on team Voltron was ever like, “Wow, I wish I could talk to Keith right now,” no, nothing like that out of  _ any  _ of their mouths. Not even Shiro. Shiro’s reason for not saying that is probably very different from everyone else’s, but regardless!

No one was ever desperate enough to talk to Keith. They all love him, of course, they’re  _ family, _ but their relationship with him is on a much lower level than Lance’s. Lance is probably God tier friendship level according to Keith.

Keith wasn’t such a vital part to their well-being. Keith was someone Lance could talk to, confide in with things he would never tell Hunk. They were like magnets, really, as much as they may have hated to admit it. Even with all their fighting, they can’t be taken apart so easily. Lance loved being with Keith! Now he’s  _ gone. _ His  _ diablito _ is far and this is the best he can do.

Besides, Lance wanted this to be a thing between just them two. No one else. Keep it exclusive. He plans on keeping up with that for as long as this plane can run.

_ Viator.  _ No! No, it’s  _ dumb, _ he should have never expected a good name for it to come out of Keith. Lance didn’t care  _ what _ it meant, it was dumb. He was expecting something cool and funny, like Sharpshootin’ Samurai-in’ Space Flyer 69, but of course, he just gets  _ Viator. _

“He named it Viator,” Lance says, folding up the letter and placing it on the counter.

“Named what?” his mom asks, reaching for the bowls above the sink. “That airplane thing?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s a stupid name.”

“Right!’ Lance runs his fingers through his hair, laughing a little. “I can’t let him name it  _ Viator. _ ” He looks at his mom, who starts piling the rice up on a plate. He leans into the counter, resting his chin in the palms of his hands. “ _ Mamá, _ help me name it.”

“Mm, I don’t know  _ hijo. _ It’s a thing between you two, not me. What are some things between you two?”

Lance thinks back. Rivalry, bonding, Altean pools, their lions, crying, uhh, no. All stupid things to name a paper airplane thing.

His mom comes towards him with a plate of that delicious  _ ropa vieja  _ he’s been waiting on. The smell fills his nose so pleasantly and he finds his stomach grumbling. When was the last time he ate?

“Thank you Mom,” he sings, anxiously grabbing the fork place on top.

“Ah, ah, ah!” his mom chants, snatching the fork from his fingers. Lance looks at her, very confused. She turns around, picks up two bowls piled with food, and grins. “I made some for Hunk and Pidge. Call them over!”

Lance’s head droops. “They aren’t coming over,” he sighs.

“You tell them I’m here and they’ll come running,” his mom assures him. “ _ Llama los! _ ”

“Even if I call them over, they won’t come.”

“Stop being so lazy and call them over! I already made them plates.”

“They aren’t  _ here, _ Mom,” Lance says through gritted teeth. “They went up north to visit Matt.”

Lance’s mom’s smile disappears and her shoulders drop. “Why didn’t you go?” she asks quietly, hoping it’s not too much to ask.

“They didn’t tell me. I’m not really friends with him anyways, so it doesn’t matter.”

She sucks in a breath, looking at the extra plates she had set aside. Lance looks too, counting two in her hands, and one next to the stove.

“ _ Y  _ Shiro? He’s here, right?” she solves. “I don’t want this food to go to waste.”

Lance smiles. He knows she can tell how visibly upset he is over his friends, but she also sees it’s a conflicting topic for him anyways. He’s not amazing friends with Matt, but his best friends went to see him without him. He felt left out, but he also had very little reason to feel that way. He’s happy she thought of Shiro. He should at least feed him after begging on his knees to ditch him and scattering out of that class once the clock struck five. He takes his phone out of his pocket and dials his number. He answers right as the ringing comes near an end.

“Lance?” Shiro says. “You need something?”

“Uh, no, but thanks for asking,” Lance answers. “Look, my mom came over by surprise and made extra food. She doesn’t want it to go to waste. Want to stop by and eat some?”

“Ah, damn, I’m really busy right now, but I also haven’t eaten…”

“You should eat,” Lance convinces, “at my place.”

“I  _ really _ need to focus on this, though.”

“What are you doing?”

Shiro grunts. “Something for Iverson.”

“Oh, fuck that! Come on over dude.”

Lance’s mom shakes her head at him. Lance gives her a thumbs up.

“You know I can’t do that.” Shiro chuckles. “I don’t want her food to go to waste. It’s too good for that.”

Lance purses his lips. “How about you take the food with you? Just come by to pick it up.”

Lance’s mom nods her head, satisfied with the outcome.

“Yeah! I’ll come down in a couple of minutes. You’re so smart, Lance.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever. See you in a little.”

Lance hangs up and shrugs. “He’s doing something for Iverson, so he can’t eat with us.”

“That’s okay,” she says, putting the plates down and opening the cabinet. “You have aluminum paper, right?”

“Why would I have aluminum paper?” Lance laughs.

His mom glares at him. “Because you have a kitchen in your dorm, unlike most of the kids at the Garrison.”

“I only have a kitchen because they declared me most likely dead and it turned out I wasn’t,” Lance scoffs. “At least I  _ kind _ of use the kitchen. You know what Pidge does? She fills the cabinet with snacks and eats out of the cereal box at two in the morning. She can’t cook to save her life.”

“Pidge is younger than you,  _ Lancito. _ ” She closes the cabinet door and pats the door. “At least it’s color coded.”

“That’s Pidge’s doing _. _ ”

She rolls her eyes. “Whatever. What can I put Shiro’s food in?”

Lance points at the cabinet next to the one above the stove. His mom opens it and gasps loudly at the sight.

“ _ ¿Porque tienes tanto platos de papel? ¿Vasos y tenedores de plástico? _ ” She stares at Lance wildly, putting him into a laughing fit. “You  _ live _ like this?”

Lance hugs his stomach. He knew the reaction she’d have to seeing stacks and stacks of paper plates and plastic cups. The box of plastic forks terrified her. It’s an easy way of living. This is all she was against. “I don’t like washing dishes!” Lance answers, trying to contain his laughter.

“Are those six bowls on top of your stove the only real plates you own?”

“Yeah, they’re good for cereal.”

“ _ Lance Sanchez _ .”

He grins at her. She starts transferring the food over to the plate, complaining to him in Spanish about how he should get some  _ real _ plates, and start getting used to washing dishes, instead of wasting money on paper plates and plastic utensils.

Lance tunes her out until Shiro knocks on the door. He jumps down from his stool and opens up, smiling at a very,  _ very  _ tired. “Jesus, what is he having you do?” Lance asks, looking him up and down. He wears gray sweatpants and a tight black t-shirt that hugs his muscles  _ very  _ nicely. Lance can’t help but stare.

“Science stuff,” Shiro answers groggily. Lance moves aside to allow him in. “Nice to see you, Ms. Sanchez.”

“Hi Shiro!” she excitingly says. As much as she loves Hunk and Pidge, Shiro has a  _ very _ special place in her heart. She credits him with being the person Lance looked up to and inspired, and also for looking after him in space. “And, for the last time, just call me Maritza.”

“Are you sure?” Shiro asks, walking towards her to go in for a hug. Lance likes it when they see each other. Space Dad and Real Mom: Interacting.

“Yes. Say it: Maritza.”

Shiro gives a quick look at Lance, for a little reassurance. Shiro feels weird calling her by her given name. He doesn’t even call his co-workers by their first name, which Lance finds even  _ weirder _ . Lance gives him a nod. His mom doesn’t like “miss.” Makes her feel old, apparently.

“Maritza,” Shiro repeats as his arms wrap around her small frame. His mom smiles on her tiptoes, head resting on his broad shoulder.

“One more time.”

“Maritza.”

She pulls away and puts a hand on his shoulder. “ _ Bueno,  _ let me just wrap up your food.”

Shiro looks around Lance’s dorm, trying to pinpoint something. “It’s cleaner.”

Lance crosses his arms. “My dorm?”

“Yeah. Who’d you pay?”

“Um,  _ no one! _ ” Lance defends. “Hunk and I did it,  _ together. _ ”

“Yeah, yeah.” Shiro points at the paper airplane-like device. “What’s that?”

_ Fuck!  _ Lance forgot to hide it before he came in, and great,  _ wow _ , he was already ruining his big ol’ secret. He literally has  _ no  _ idea how to come back from this, he can’t even think of a  _ lie _ —

“Oh, that’s a toy Irene found to give to Lance!” his mom butts in. Lance release a quiet sigh of relief. His mom always saves the day. “Her mommy wouldn’t let her keep it because it’s a little sharp and all, so she thought she should give it to her space  _ tío. _ ”

“Yeah!” Lance picks it up along with the folded letter from Keith. “She even gave me instructions, isn’t she so cute? Camila should have just let her keep it, but you know my sister.”

Shiro nods, definitely believing it. “I don’t know Camila at all.”

“Oh.” Lance raises his eyebrow. “You don’t?” He has to think back to all the times his huge family met his Garrison friends.

Maritza gives the food to Shiro between two plastic plates. “Did you know Lance has a whole cabinet full of paper plates and plastic cups? Did you know this is how he lives?”

Shiro gives her a sincere smile. “Are you surprised?”

“No, but I expected better.”

“I’m right here,” Lance mentions, raising his right hand to make his presence known.

Shiro and his mom roll their eyes simultaneously, making Lance’s eyes widen at having simply experienced that. Shiro thanks Lance’s mom and leaves to do his science stuff.

“Good save, with the device,” Lance says while closing the door. He really almost lost it there.

“You’re welcome,” she says, placing her hands on her hips. “Now, what are we going to do with this extra plate?”

Lance sits back down, placing the device and letter to the right of him. Maritza hands him his fork back, looks at the bowls of food, and sighs. She glances back and forth between Lance and the food, then picks up both plates. She moves towards the counter, leaves a space between Lance’s right and her, and places the food down. Lance watches her slide a plate next to the plane, smiling as she does so.

“Let’s just say I’m feeding your  _ diablito, _ ” she jokes. She beams at him, her tired, old eyes getting a little smaller. The wrinkles on her face are as prominent as they are beautiful. “Get it? Because you talk to him through this? So I can ‘feed’ him through it? Funny, right?”

Lance’s mouth opens wide into a grin. He gapes at the device. “Mom, you’re a genius!”

She raises an eyebrow at him, very confused by his reaction. “What’d I do?”

Lance picks up the device. “I’ll name it  _ Diablito. _ Because that’s what I call him, and it’s way better than  _ Viator _ , and look”—he runs his finger along the edges—“it’s red and white. Like his jacket!”

Maritza smiles. “Tell him it means traveler in Spanish.”

Lance raises his arms above his head, his mouth still wide open with pride. “Yes! Yes, yes, yes! He’ll totally fall for it, since he failed Spanish!”

They both laugh for a little, then start eating, all while thinking of his  _ Diablito. _

******

Lance begins writing his letter as his mom sleeps on his bed with her cute Hello Kitty pajamas. She snores softly, and it bothered him when he was younger, but now he’s used to it. He would have started working on that hacking, but his computer is still trying to get through everybody in the cafeteria system. He lies down on the couch he managed to have his older brother, Ramón, ship him a few months ago. It wasn’t allowed, but Lance managed to use the whole “dead for a year” thing to his advantage at the Garrison. He even got Shiro, Hunk and Pidge couches as well.

His legs are bent at the knee, a piece of paper on a textbook which rests on his thighs. He twirls a pen in his fingers, browsing his head for what he should write. He can ask him some more questions, or tell him what he thinks about Veldis, or maybe both.

What he  _ wasn’t _ going to write him was about how no one knows about  _ Diablito _ , or talk to him about the war in detail. Not yet. Maybe they’ll have to send each other a couple more letters for that to happen. Who knows how long this will go?

Lance looks over Keith’s letter, an idea coming to his head. He sits up a little to look over the couch and out the window. The night has its speckles of stars, but something outshines them all here on Earth. If Keith got to talk about the stars, then Lance is gonna talk about the moon.

******


	3. music boxes

Keith respected his elders, but  _ damn, _ he wanted to punch Kolivan in the face.

He’s never seen him smile, but today, that had changed. Kolivan smiled. At Keith. Holding in his laugh. Why? Because Keith  _ never fucking learned how to properly use this big ass orange panel and now he looks like an idiot trying to maneuver it. _

“Can you at least  _ teach _ me?” Keith almost growls, glaring at him from over his shoulder. He  _ hates _ it when he looks dumb. He’s fine with being wrong, but laughing at him for being clueless is the  _ worst. _ Kolivan stands behind, arms hugging his torso, shoulders hunched up, suppressing his laugh as much as possible.

All Keith wanted to learn was how to get to the main screen. He finished looking at the security footage, and usually that’s all he needed, but today he wanted to look something up. He needed a map of Veldis. That’s it! Just a map, and getting to it is probably easy, if Kolivan would just  _ teach him. _

“Keith, it’s so obvious how to do it!” Kolivan releases his laugh, the deep sound echoing around the room.

“I don’t know Galra tech! Or the language! And I’ve been doing this for three weeks!” Keith takes his hands away from the panel and throws his hood over his head. “Can you  _ just _ help me?”

“Help the kid, Kolivan!” a voice from the end of the room, also in the middle of a laughing fit, booms.

Keith turns towards the sound, his eyes going back to Kolivan. “Someone’s  _ in here? _ ” Keith’s insecurity folds in on him. He sends Kolivan a killer glare, something that should read “I’m angry at you for  _ laughing at me  _ and not advising me that  _ others are in the room _ .”

Kolivan calms down a little, walking towards the panel. “All the way to the left,” he says, pointing to the end of the panel. There’s four rectangles, each with different Galra writing below it. “The top one will change the middle screen to the map. There is no ‘main screen,’ Keith.”

“ _ Thank you, _ ” Keith breathes out, reaching over to tap the rectangle button. Kolivan had gotten increasingly annoying in the worst way since he assigned him this mission. All he was able to offer up were these lousy security footages that showed the same  _ damn _ thing—a couple Galra handing things over to others, or standing around suspiciously. It was  _ annoying _ at this point. To top it off, sometimes it was entirely different people, or it was the same Galra they identified the first time, and that just made things more complicated. Who’s to say that those different people are just going on with their lives? Not all of them are affiliated with Morfran or Bruns. Nedra never showed up again on the footage, so maybe she was just there coincidentally. It didn’t make any sense!

Keith  _ still _ isn’t sure how to go about this mission. He doesn’t have a cloaking device, or a giant robot lion, to be intimidating and sneaky. He has a mask, which is nice, but it gives him away regardless because he’s at least three feet shorter than the entire  _ race. _ He couldn’t rely on footage to dismantle a  _ possible _ rebel group. Nothing was certain! The Blade of Marmora was just going based off their gut. And it was annoying.

The middle screen switches to an aerial view of Veldis. From above, Keith can see the three purple headquarters, the shadows cast from it extending over the makeshift “marketplace” (very few sellers—the Galra still hasn’t figured out a currency—so more like hangout area). A large distance away are the several houses that makeup the precincts, many which are still being expanded.

“What do you need this for?”

“I don’t know Veldis that well,” Keith admits, despite the fact he’s been living here for around six months, “and I have to look at possible locations for possible secret meetings for a possible rebel group.”

“How does he not know Veldis well?” the person in the back yells. Keith squints his eyes just at the sound of the voice.

“You’ve been helping build houses and passing out goods for a while,” Kolivan mentions. “Why don’t you know it well?”

“In my defense, most of the stuff I do is around these headquarters,” he says. “I don’t go walking around the precincts and making friends. They see the suit and I get mixed reactions. I can’t just simply unmask myself like the rest of you and blend in.”

Kolivan stays silent, but Keith hears the person in the back say “fair point” faintly. Keith drags his finger around the center pad, and the view changes. He zooms in to the biggest precinct they’ve made (the Eastern Precinct), each house being the same rectangle shape, white color, and compact. He looks for  _ something _ that would make a decent meet-up location. An empty space amidst the tightness, the surrounding area, a secret entrance,  _ anything. _

Keith looks at other precincts, hoping for the same, but realizes it’s pointless. The only way he is going to find something is by exploring it for himself. He may stand out, but it’s his only option at this point.

“Okay,” Keith says. He backs away from the panel, throwing his hood over his head. “That’s all I need for today. Anything else?”

Kolivan shakes his head. His eyes follow Keith as he exits the room.

******

Keith masks himself as he makes his way out of the headquarters. A tiny notebook hides in his pocket as he walks towards the precincts, the sun beating vigorously against his suit. While the suit is light and excellent for combat, the color scheme of it is one that isn’t ideal for Veldis, or at least at this time of year.

Keith likes wearing his mask. It hides him from the rest of the Blades, and while he does believe he still stands out because of his size, it isn’t so bad. Some Blades are only a few inches taller than him, and when he’s in a group, he blends in.

Keith’s going out to the precincts for two reasons: to get to know the area on a personal level, and to look for potential secret locations.

If he didn’t need to find out about those two, then he would have  _ never  _ made his way here. He hates the precincts! They built these precincts for the first four months of the Veldis Task and it was  _ tedious.  _ Technically, he shouldn’t be allowed to even walk in the precincts.

To make a long story short, Keith has always been a troublemaker, putting him in charge of things he never learned how to use was not smart, and he kind of ruins everything he touches. It really should have only taken two months to make the thousands of houses they planned, but Keith pressed  _ one _ wrong button, and they had to double the time.

Though the precincts look nothing like they do on Earth, there’s an urban, homey feel to it. Like what they describe in Christmas songs, but all the time, no matter what the weather. All the Galra mostly feel the same and have spent so much time stuck on one big ass ship that they  _ are _ family. It’s actually pretty ideal.

Every house he passes by has the same facade, shape, and color—one large glass window to the right of the black entry door, a porch that can fit two chairs, and three stairs leading up. There isn’t really a roof—it’s like the Blade of Marmora put a pyramid on the top of the house and smoothed down the edges. They all have different Galra symbols to separate them, but Keith wouldn’t know what to look for if he had to.

Galra children play in the streets safely, thanks to the very limited amount of vehicles the Blade has, and adults look on from their porch and windows.

The only thing different is the aura, and it’s definitely Keith’s fault. Again, the Galra aren’t fond of the Blade of Marmora, so if they see a member walking down their street,  _ alone, _ it’s concerning. Just one Blade has so much power over them.

Keith doesn’t really. One, he’s not  _ entirely  _ a Blade of Marmora. Well, he is, but he only did it for some time. These people have done it for years. Two, physically, he doesn’t pose a threat. They are so much taller than him, it’s like living with giants. Three, he is high-key scared of them. He may be 50% related to them but  _ hell, _ he fought these guys for a year and a half, and they almost killed him multiple times.

Their yellow gleam seems like it pierces through his suit, scaringly enough. Kids back off the street as he strides through, a couple running back into their homes. Keith  _ wants _ to lower his head in shame, but reels back into the habit of comfortingly rubbing his thumb against his clenched fist. He’s shameful that this suit makes them react this way—scared, protective, vengeful. It’s exactly what the Blade of Marmora  _ isn’t  _ supposed to represent, but that’s what it does. The Galra’s reason for it are completely valid, too.

Keith observes the precincts until the sky turns gray. Each precinct, he finds the same scene: Keith interrupting their daily routine by walking down their street, causing fleeing and silence to ensue.

His stomach growls. He didn’t bring any snacks with him, and he’s been too scared to take his mask off. He stops in the middle of the street, where no one is out now that the sun is starting to set. Keith sighs, blowing a raspberry at the sky.

Just his luck, isn’t it? He goes out to do work on his own and finds nothing. He’s running out of ideas as he looks at the horizon, completely hopeless. Why give Keith such a difficult mission? Not going back home was hard enough.

Someone behind him clears their throat, shocking him back into reality. He turns around quickly and is relieved at who stands in front of him. Sigrun’s white hair is tied up into a bun, a bag of materials hugged to her chest. She wears a gray suit with white lining on top of a black turtleneck, a smile playing on her lips.

“What are you doing out here?” she asks, looking him up and down, chuckling a little.

“Observing,” he answers. Why’s she looking him up and down? She’s seen him in his suit before. Does he look  _ that _ out of place?

“Something tells me you’re lying Ke—”

“Please don’t say my name.” He sighs, pulling his hood closer over his head. “Don’t want people to know. And I’m not lying. I have no other reason to be in the Eastern Precinct.” Keith points at what she’s holding. “What are you doing here with that?”

She looks down at her bag. “Oh!” She pats the bag. It’s the navy blue bags the Blade of Marmora hand out to the Galra people. “It’s for me.”

Keith furrows his eyebrows. “Blades of Marmora don’t get material bags for the Galra…”

Sigrun giggles, tilting her head to look better at his expression. “I live in the precinct.”

Keith’s mouth drops behind the mask. She can’t live in the precinct if she works in the headquarters...right?

“I’ll explain some more if you join me at my home? You don’t have to be back at headquarters yet, I think.”

“U-Uh, sure!” Keith hesitantly agrees. He caves in because, maybe, he can learn a little more about the precinct, while also finding out why the hell Sigrun lives here instead. He follows her lead down the street he’s gone down too many times today. 

Soon enough, they’re at her home, the indoors looking exactly how he remembered when they made them: white walls, white furniture, marble floors all around. The small living room greets Keith first. There’s one large sofa and a loveseat adjacent to each other. Following the living room is the kitchen, clad in grey scale marble. A small table for four is put on the side, next to a doorway that leads to the extra rooms.

“You can sit down while I put these away,” Sigrun says, leaving the bag on the table and digging through it. She takes out what belongs in the kitchen, stuffs it in some cabinets, and joins Keith in the living room. She pulls out a chair from the table and sits backwards, her arms and chin resting on the back of it.

“So...why do you live in the precincts?” Keith asks, crossing his legs as he sits in the loveseat.

“I’ll tell you when you make yourself comfortable,” she laughs, taking her hair out of its tie. “Take your mask off. I’ve got the curtains down and a story to tell.”

Keith decides to let it down since Sigrun’s already seen how he looks and shouldn’t be so terrified of him. His bangs fluff up and he takes his hood down to run his fingers through his hair.

“I’m not  _ actually _ a part of the Blade of Marmora,” she confesses, moving all her hair to her right shoulder. Keith becomes intrigued with the beginning quickly.

“You can only work in the headquarters if—”

“If you’re a Blade,” she sighs, beginning to braid her white hair, “I know. I’m not there, like, illegally or anything. It all starts about, let’s say, thirty-ish years ago?”

Why’s she going so far back? The answer to the question should be easy, Keith thinks.

“Anyways, I  _ used _ to be part of the Blade of Marmora. I had escaped Zarkon’s regime and found my way into the team. Kolivan put me through a test, just to make sure I was fit enough for the job, and I passed. I was with them for years, doing all sorts of missions and all, until I had gotten captured by the Galra on Zarkon’s ship. Infiltration gone wrong. I was a prisoner until Voltron defeated the evil, and the Blade of Marmora set me free. They recognized me, but I had been gone for so long that there was no way I could keep up with them now. I still deserved my place as a member, though, so they gave me the best they could.” She ties off her braid and smiles at Keith. “Now I deliver you your mail.”

“They didn’t even give you a room in  _ headquarters? _ ” Keith isn’t even surprised. The Blade of Marmora only treats a few cluster correctly, and for everybody to get the treatment they deserve is a stretch. Her experience with them only gives reason to the scars and wiseness he caught from her the first time. “There’s plenty of rooms that are empty. We have three fucking headquarters and they didn’t give you  _ one? _ ”

“Well, I’m not exactly complaining, Keith. Look around! I have a house all to myself, and I’m not paying anything. I can take care of myself and all. I like the precincts.” She laughs, looking around her humble home. “All you have is a bed and bathroom. I also get to reconnect with the Galra I grew up with and learn more about them.” Sigrun eyes stop at Keith and she looks sadly at him. “Isn’t that what you’re trying to do, human?”

Keith swallows, his body stiffening. The only person who can figure him out this easily is Lance. “How’d you know?”

“What other reason would a member of Voltron want to help the Blade of Marmora? Your trial was also a big deal. Everyone went a little crazy, wondering how a Galra could have possibly mated with a human all those years ago.”

“I don’t think about that.”

“Which parent was Galra?” 

To tell her or not? No one exactly knows except team Voltron. It wasn’t a big deal either—of course one of his parents are Galra. Why would it matter which one?

“My mother,” Keith confesses.

“Have you learned anything about her?”

Keith shakes his head. “I haven’t even had time to learn about the Galra language and customs and traditions. Kolivan’s had me so busy—”

“I’ll help you!” Sigrun offers ecstatically. Her bun bounces as she holds her excitement back. “I’ll tell you everything about the Galra when I can, if you want.”

“I’d take it up, but I can’t actually, like, sit down through a lecture. I’d like to read up on it or something. I won’t have time to do anything else.”

“Then how about little facts here and there? When I go drop off your mail or something. Nothing too life-altering.”

Sigrun seems elated about this. Sitting around the messaging office all day has to be boring, so coming up with new things to share with Keith should offer her at least  _ some _ interest. Keith gives her a half smile. “That’d be nice.”

“Perfect! I’ll have something by the time Kolivan wants me to relay a message or your little plane thing comes by.”

He suppresses a grin. To be completely honest, all he’s been looking forward to these past weeks was a letter back from Lance. He hopes it got to him safely, that the little plane made it back to Earth in one piece.

Something in Sigrun’s living room catches his eye. In the corner is a small, round, glass table, and on top of it is a familiar looking object. A metal box, with a single crank on the side, and an purple insignia on top. Keith unconsciously gets up and strides towards it.

He had one of these—back on Earth, when he was a child and lived with his father. It’s a music box that played a melody like none you could ever hear on Earth. Keith never knew where it came from—had always thought his dad bought it somewhere—but he loved it so much that he took it away with him when he could no longer be with his father.

“Galra music boxes,” Sigrun says, coming up behind him. “Pretty, huh?”

“Y-Yeah...I have one back at home.”

“In the headquarters?”

“No, no, on Earth.” He picks it up carefully, twisting it in his hands. “You say it’s Galran?”

“Yeah. When Daibaazal was destroyed, so was our culture and traditions. Of course they weren’t forgotten, but we had to find a way to preserve them. The Galra love music. We use it for everything, from birthdays to ceremonies to deaths. It’s the most prominent aspect of our culture, and when we lost it with Daibaazal, it was all kind of agreed on that we had to preserve that first. We couldn’t remake our instruments, because many of those who made them died, but we knew how to make music boxes. We put our thousands of songs into them. It’s...the closest thing to home. There’s your first Galra fact.”

Keith holds it up to his eyes. The insignia is like a DNA strand, but with three rungs and more curved and stretched out. Purple ink sinks into the mold of it. “Can I?” he asks with his fingers on the crank. Sigrun nods.

A solemn melody plays. Keith hasn’t heard music in two years, so hearing it is nostalgic. It brings him back to Earth, back to his youth, back to his dad. He lets the song play, then puts the box back down.

“That’s a funerary song,” Sigrun tells. “No lyrics. A friend of mine died while we were prisoners. Someone in the neighboring cell had made it for me a few weeks after.”

“I’m sorry for your loss.”

Sigrun smiles. “Thank you.”

Keith begins to leave, letting Sigrun know he’ll see her tomorrow. The sky is now night, which means he’ll have to be quick in getting through the headquarters. Today was unsuccessful, minus a nice chat with a new friend. He learned nothing about this possible rebel group. He couldn’t find the people he found on camera, or suspicious activity, not even a possible meeting location. He glares at the towering buildings that the Blade of Marmora call home, adorned by the stars against it. He loves those stars, and he misses gazing at them from the roof. Maybe he should do that. He should do that  _ tonight. _

******

An idea hit Keith the moment he entered the headquarters. From that height, he could see so much a Veldis, and with a good pair of binoculars, he could observe the precincts from afar. He’s so small they wouldn’t  _ possibly  _ be able to point him out against all the ruckus up on the roof. Killing two birds with one stone.

Keith sits up against one of the many appliances that power up his building. His hood is up so none of the debris gets into his hair.

Though he looks at the stars every night, it’s through his window. No one’s allowed on the roof. Keith only managed to find his way up here because he accidentally took the wrong staircase to his room when he first got to Veldis. He found himself coming back just to look at the view, no matter what time of day. So much chaos went on around this planet that sitting on the roof of the tallest headquarters was the most peaceful thing to do. There’s no filter up here. The brilliance of the stars are as real as can be.

Keith wishes he had music. Some kind of instrumental to go along with the scene, like that music box. The desert his shack is in has almost as many stars as Veldis at night. There, he’d lie down on the roof with his dad. He’d bring out his book of constellations and ask for help looking for them. When his dad saw that Keith was getting tired, yet wanted to keep going, he’d bring out the silver music box. He’d crank it as much as he could and play it as he pretended to search for constellations. It was a happy tune, reminiscent of a lullaby. Keith would begin to fall asleep on his father’s lap and he’d be carried down to his room.

He misses those days. The days he had with his dad.

The music box back at home was from his mom, just like his knife. It played a Galran tune. Keith grew up with that extra little piece of his heritage and it made his heart a little warm. He missed out on so many years of not knowing that. He wonders what the song meant or what ceremony it was used for.

Keith stops thinking about it as the weight of the binoculars in his hands becomes apparent. He holds them up to his eyes and zooms into the precincts. How could Galra technology be so good? He thought the  _ Altean _ tech was amazing, but the Galra had ten thousand years to advance further more. The lenses are crystal clear, zooming in at distances Keith can’t see with his bare eyes. The distance measurement is shown at the corner of the lens (if Keith hadn’t learned basic Galra symbols, it would be  _ pointless _ ) and it auto-focuses. If Keith needs to identify something, he simply twists the handle on the side of the binoculars and lands his pointer on it. A quick summary of the object pops up at the opposite corner.

Pidge would freak out over this.

The precincts look empty, as they should. It’s late at night and way past curfew. Of course, that in no way helps Keith’s situation, but it’s good to know they’re following the rules. A few house lights are on, but most of the Galra are asleep.

Keith’s view passes over the precincts. Most of the activity is the same until he catches one too many lights on. He zooms in further and finds five people huddled in a backyard. The house lights are on in addition to the back ones and everyone seems to be holding a flashlight. They all wear black beanies over their heads. None of the faces he can see look familiar, but as for the two backs facing him, he doesn’t know. A voice in the back of his head reminds him of Bruns and Morfran. They’re definitely talking—Keith can see their mouths moving quickly—and they’re trying to keep it as discreet as possible. The crowd is constantly looking around, despite being in a private home.

Soon enough they take out devices smaller than the size of their palm. He has the binoculars identify them, but it pops up in the Galra language. The image is also really blurry and they quickly hide it in their hand. He rolls his eyes.  _ That _ won’t help him. Keith can’t think of what their use could be. One of the Galra whose back is to him takes out a pile of papers from a satchel on their back and hands them out. They seem to be explaining something to the rest of the group, the rest understanding completely, and then they disperse. Their backs are kept to Keith, even as they travel back home.

He puts his binoculars down and gets to writing in his notes. It’s exciting! Finally some progress that isn’t from footage. What he got was  _ basically _ what he could get from footage, but there aren’t any cameras in the precincts. You can only find them at the entrance, but anything further than that is deemed as an invasion of privacy. The Galra had to fight for that right. With  _ this, _ he knows where their meetings are possibly being held. He’ll have to examine for a couple quintants straight, but he’ll prove it. He’ll prove to Kolivan that he’s capable, even if he doesn’t completely believe it himself.

******

Keith keeps an eye on the area for five quintants. They’ve met there every night an hour past curfew, taking out materials he’s never seen before from a bag, and new pieces of paper are handed out every night. The footage he’s been given in the mornings only help him a little. The faces he sees at night are not the ones he sees in the footage from the marketplace. The most valuable information he’s got from the mornings is the exact location of their meetings, thanks to the map.

Now that he’s certain of his research, he decides to tell Kolivan about it today. There’s a range of reactions he can get from it, but he has a comeback for each one. 

Regardless of how confident Keith feels, he’s still got a nervous jitter when he enters the meeting room. His mask goes down as he walks up the platform, standing next to the huge figure that is Kolivan. There’s only security footage on the middle screen, meaning that was the only thing the Blade of Marmora deemed suspicious. Bruns and Morfran are on screen, again, but they only casually talk with a vendor. They wear the normal gray clothing that were given to the Galra, while the vendor wears a burgundy shirt with gold lining. The table suggests he sells thread, and it seems that Bruns and Morfran are bulk-buying. The vendor digs under the table and take out a box about the size of his chest. It’s black and tightly lidded. The two take it with a smile on their purple face.

“What do you think a box of thread could insinuate?” Kolivan asks him, taking control of the panel and identifying the vendor on his own.

“I don’t know what good a box of thread would do,” Keith answers, crossing his arms. “What do you think?”

“I don’t think they got thread. Those two didn’t give the vendor any money, and he didn’t seem to mind.”

Keith nods, seeing his point. “So this rebel group—you think it’s more than just the people we’ve identified.”

“Of course. I don’t think it’s  _ huge, _ but it definitely has that potential. Not that many Galra can hate us.”

Keith stays silent, deciding he has nothing further to add. He doesn’t think that the Galra necessarily hate the Blade of Marmora. They’re just scared. How many times do their own have to take absolute power?

_ Now. _ Now is the time to tell Kolivan. He digs his little notebook out of his pocket, clearing his throat. “K-Kolivan,” he trips on his words, “I did some research on my own and found something interesting.”

The other looks down at him from the side. Keith gulps at the stare he’s being given—yellow eyes could never be scarier. “Is that so, Kogane?”

“Yes,” he says, turning to the page of his notes, “and please don’t call me Kogane again.” He takes a deep breath, quickly glancing at his notes, and readies himself. “I was observing the precincts and found a secret meetings being held in a backyard. They—”

“What precincts?” Kolivan interrupts.

“Uh, oh! The Eastern Precinct.” He just  _ had _ to be interrupted. “There were five people, three whose faces I could see and two whose I couldn’t, and they met up there every night—”

“What time?”

Keith presses his lips together, holding in his growing anger from being interrupted. “An hour past curfew.”

“Interesting. Go on.”

“I observed for a couple of quintants, just to make sure that it was a regular occurrence. They did so each one of those quintants. They always conversed, got materials out of bags, and were given papers. I wrote down the location in my notebook.”

Keith turns to the page and hands it to Kolivan. He takes it suspiciously. “What materials?”

“Well, they have communication devices, and I saw materials I’ve never seen before.”

“What materials?” Kolivan repeats, facing and leaning closer to him with every syllable.

“I don’t know,” Keith races to say. His immense height, stare, fear-mongering tone, all of it makes Keith want to fold himself into a box and be shipped away. He hates how small Kolivan makes him feel. “The binoculars identify them in Galran and I can’t read—”

“How have you  _ not _ learned it yet?” he sighs. He puts his hands on his hips. “Good work anyways. What are you going to do now?”

Keith holds in his beam. He thought about this for some time, and he’s quite satisfied with the resolution he’s come up with. “I was thinking about installing microphones in the area, so it could be—”

“Cameras.”

Keith blinks. “Huh?”

“Let’s install cameras.”

Keith furrows his brow. Is he dumb? Is Kolivan thick in the head? His ideas aren’t too bad, usually, but this? It’s stupid. “There aren’t any cameras in the area, so to install one would be too obvious,” Keith reasons.

“I don’t think so,” he counter argues. “Plus, it’d give us an easier way to identify them all, and we could see  _ and _ hear what’s going on.”

“No.”

Kolivan glares at him, concerned about the attitude seeping from Keith’s voice.

“No!” Keith repeats a little louder, letting his body unstiffen. “Why are you so obsessed with identifying? If we put in a microphone, we’ll get the same information. They’re  _ bound _ to say each other’s name when speaking, and the group is probably being told what each material is used for and such. A camera is too obvious. Installing a microphone is small, whether it be in the location or on the person.”

“How big do you think our cameras are, Keith? They aren’t the size of your lion’s head. They’re as small as the microphones and directly link to the Blade of Marmora.”

“Yeah, but  _ I’m _ in charge of this, aren’t I? You put me in charge of this. I come in here before the morning alarm  _ everyday _ to look at the security footage you won’t give me direct access to.”

“This is confidential Blade of Marmora material—”

“I  _ am  _ a Blade of Marmora!” Keith exclaims, slamming his hand down on the panel. “Do you forget that? Is it because I don’t  _ look _ like it? I don’t have purple skin and furry ears, but I’m part of the Blade of Marmora, and I’m half Galra! I have a right to this!”

“You are  _ nowhere  _ near having the right to confidential material,” Kolivan spits back, eyes narrowing at him. “You have way less power than I do, so don’t try to compare it. And  _ I  _ don’t like your tone of voice.”

“I could probably care less! All I want are microphones in the area. And I can’t get microphones without you authorizing it.”

“And I  _ won’t, _ because you’ll be installing cameras in the area.”

“That wasn’t part of my plan.”

“I can tweak your plan as I please.”

Keith balls his hands up into fists and grunts. Soon enough he’s rubbing his thumb against his fist to help him calm down and avoid lashing out. He storms out of the room, activating his mask again and walking through the empty halls of the headquarters.

Why did he think Kolivan could possibly side with him? There were few instances when he did. Even when they were up against Zarkon, their views differed, and Kolivan always had the upper hand. Kolivan didn’t want others risking their own lives for another team member. Risking your life for the cause was more honorable, and Keith fell for that. He took it upon  _ himself _ to hold up to that honor, and it ruined him. He couldn’t believe what he tried to do.

The moment Lotor saved him, he felt different. Sitting in his pilot jet, halting as fast as he could, staring at the destruction _he_ could have caused and not woken up to see. A flood of emotions had hit him all at once. He hadn’t thought it through, he hadn’t thought a _suicide_ _mission_ through, and when he did, it terrified him. Could he have really given all that up so quickly? Given up his team, Voltron, the Blade of Marmora, the rest of his life? Was it that important to him?

He had stayed, not moving for some time, and then returned to the Blade of Marmora. Keith was greeted with respect and applause. Applause, because he was ready to give his life for the cause. Respect, because only a few would do what he attempted. That was the proudest Kolivan had ever been of Keith. That’s when he gave him the respect he should have gotten when he went through the trials. Only after he tried to do something for them would he get it.

That made Keith look at himself differently. His purpose there, in the Blade of Marmora—it wasn’t only to help defeat Zarkon. It was to also be used for the greater good, whether it be for Voltron or for the world. Keith was expendable. They were  _ all _ expendable, and leaving everything behind wasn’t as big of a deal as many made it.

It wasn’t until he faced Lance and his wrath that he realized how  _ wrong _ that feeling was. It hurt so damn much, watching someone he had fallen for time after time be so torn about Keith just trying to do his job. Lance getting upset at the  _ idea _ of Keith leaving them for that cause. The team cared about him,  _ Lance _ cared about him. The hurt in his eyes and voice is something he can never forget. Even when he tried to dignify his newfound opinions, he saw how wrong they were because Lance contradicted  _ every single one of them. _ Seeing him so angry and upset because of Keith brought back those feelings he had after his attempted suicide mission. Really, how  _ could _ he have given all that up? At the time, it had seen like the only solution, but it  _ wasn’t, _ and he should have known that. He should have talked to his team before he came to that conclusion. Everything that ran through his head, everything he loved, how could he have decided to give that up?

That’s why Keith had broken down in front of Lance. He had so much trust in that loser that he did what he feared most—cry. He cried and told him everything, everything he was feeling in that moment in his pilot jet, after he got back to the Blade of Marmora, even shaking in Lance’s arms. Why was Lance so easy to talk to? Why was he so easy to  _ fall _ for?

And yet, when he came back to the Blade of Marmora, Kolivan praised him for everything he almost sacrificed. Keith had ingrained in his head that it was wrong, but who was he to talk back to Kolivan? It’d be no use. Kolivan always had it his way, as Keith noticed during his time with them. He’s a force to be reckoned with.

His room door shuts behind him and he plops down on his bed. He is not going to go out today. He isn’t going to help with anything. Instead, he’s going to figure out a way to get his hands on some microphones. He’s going to think of possible people who can help him get what he wants.

And he’s going to go back to sleep. He’s going to sleep to his heart’s desire. Keith can’t remember the last time he slept in.

******

The next day sees Keith not doing anything again. He decided the night before that he was going to be a tiny bit rebellious for 48 hours. His absence for two quintants isn’t going to ruin the way the Veldis Task works. There’s so many members, each one should get a break more often than they do.

It’s the afternoon and Keith’s hitting his head against the wall softly. What kind of dumbass leaves his notebook with Kolivan? That notebook doesn’t _only_ have notes on his mission, no, it has doodles and sketches of the stars, things he’s never seen before, Lance’s coordinates, and more embarrassingly, _people._ _People_ he didn’t like, _people_ who had features he’s never seen before, _people_ he found mildly attractive, drawn into the paper of his notebook. All of that? In Kolivan’s hands?

Keith hits his head, hard, one last time.

Without it, it’s quite boring. All Keith’s really done is roll up his sweatpants because they’re too big, trim his hair, change the bed covers, and thought out loud to himself. The sky wasn’t even entertaining at this time of day.

But, as Keith discovered yesterday, he is  _ really _ good at taking naps. He just falls into them with a snap of his fingers.

He sleeps until a knock at his door interrupts him. Groggily, he gets up, taking a quick look outside his window to see that the sky is in its purple stage. The door opens once it sensors his movements and he’s greeted with a smile from Sigrun.

Her hair, for the first time ever, he realizes, is loose and down her back. It’s  _ very _ long, the ends coming around her mid thigh. In her hands is what he’s been waiting for all this time. She holds it up and out towards him. “It came back,” she gleefully says.

Keith takes the paper airplane-like device from her hands, a grin creeping on his face. It did it. Lance really managed to make something so durable and advanced that it could travel back and forth between Earth and Veldis more than once. He hears Sigrun giggle, making him look up at her.

“You seem excited.”

“I am,” Keith confesses, relaxed just by holding the little airplane. “Anything else for me?”

“I haven’t seen you around for, like, three quintants.” It’s nice to know she’s at least a little concerned. “What’s up?”

“Oh, it’s nothing, really.” Keith brushes it off. He hasn’t made a big deal out of it. He just wants his notebook back.

She crosses her arms. “Kolivan is mad.”

Keith shrugs. He’s not too worried. “Thanks for this Sigrun.”

“You’re welcome but before I go!” She holds one finger out to stop Keith from doing anything else. He freezes. “Galra fact: red markings are a recessive trait!”

Keith blinks, then smiles.  _ Right. Galra facts. _ “I forgot about that. Nice to know. Thanks.”

“No problem, Keith. Have a goodnight.”

“You too.”

When the door shuts, Keith  _ jumps. _ He’s ridiculously excited! He’s been thinking about this for what’s probably been a  _ month!  _ A letter back from Lance, telling Keith about how his life has been, a response to his questions, hell, Lance could talk about that niece of his he always bragged about when they were in Voltron—anything! It’s so entertaining, reading what Lance has to say. He gets little butterflies in his stomach just thinking about it.

Keith lies down on his bed, pressing the button to open up the device. He takes out the envelope with his name at the front. Ripping it open, he takes the letter out and something falls out into his lap. He picks it up and finds a polaroid in between his fingers. The photo is of the night sky, moon beaming with light in the center, with the Fraunhofer line as the horizon. The stars are scattered, not as visible, a little less than Veldis, but very much like the ones at the Garrison. The ones where Lance is.

The ones closest to home.

Keith places it down on his stomach and unfolds the letter, fingers shaky.

_ Is this?????? Keith???? Replying to me? To Lance Sanchez? And LECTURING ME THE MOMENT I OPEN THE LETTER????? _

_ There’s no one else it can possibly be :D _

_ Do you know how excited I got? I was grading papers with Shiro when I saw this thing fly by the window and towards its landing location. I could’ve spilled coffee all over myself but I saved myself heheheh _

_ Point is—I had no fucking clue this would get back! I had sent it so long ago that I wasn’t sure if it even made it to you. I was really considering going back to making prototypes and all, which would have been a lot of work, but hey, anything to talk with my samurai. _

_ Glad it got to Veldis safely. Was really worried that it got into the hands of Kolivan and  _ _ he _ _ sent a letter back telling me to leave you alone and that communication was forbidden, yaddah yaddah yaddah, whatever @ that big ole furry _

_ Yes! I’m insane! I thought you knew this. Kind of disappointed man :// _

_ The Galra were really brought into Veldis in handcuffs? What the heck. What’s the point of that? They aren’t exactly dangerous, i’m guessing. Right? It’s just kind of...hypocritical? Like, “hey, i know you’ve been under a tyrant most of your life, but now we’ve liberated you! Still gotta keep you in chains tho. Just for a lil tinsy bit.” but??? They also went through that??? I dont know keith it just sounds ridiculous _

_ Also????? Why the hell is your job so boring ohmygod like really?? With that much boredom you should be able to find out about your people but nooooOOooOOO. You hand out food and build shit. That’s what first year engineer students at the Garrison do to make money. Freakin’ Shiro used to work in the cafeteria before he got all high and mighty. I think about that a lot lol _

_ But Veldis sounds great! If I had known about that planet back as a paladin, I’d definitely have escaped the castle and gone to hang out there for a little. It has got its differences, but definitely sounds the most like Earth. Grass and nice rivers, an actual sun.  _

_ Seems like you got a thing for the stars, though. They’re really nice, aren’t they? You describe them so prettily. I mean, you say the sky is your favorite part, and stars are obviously in the sky, but i’m pretty sure you like dem stars more. I get what you mean, with the whole city stars compared to Garrison stars. _

_ Which is why I thought about taking a picture of the sky for you. Well, taking a polaroid of it. I can’t exactly send you a message through our phones or something. I gotta send something physical, and i got this old polaroid camera from my mom when i enjoyed the aesthetic in my teen years. Anyways, a little reminder about what the sky is like back on Earth. It’s got two stages—day and night! Three colors—blue, gray, and black! Mostly i dont know sometimes it’s like pink and orange and purple depends on how messed up the pollution is. _

_ What you failed to mention is a moon. Does Veldis have a moon? The galaxy is so weird out there that i don’t know what planets have and don’t have. Remember that planet that didn’t have a sun? How the hell do you survive without one of those? _

_ I concluded that, no, there isn’t a moon, and you’re missing it. You miss the moon~~ so  _ _ i’m _ _ gonna tell you about the moon, and why i like it so much. _

_ The moon, in a way, is the sun. I’ve always liked the sun, but that thing is so overwhelming sometimes? Like chill it don’t gotta be that hot bro. _

_ The moon shines the brightest at night. There’s tons of stars and lights, but you just can’t beat the moon. There’s only one of it, and it’s individual. Our moon is  _ _ our _ _ moon. Jupiter’s got its own moons, Saturn’s got its own moons, even Mars has its moons. They’re different though, and they probably look different, and they’re different sizes and all. Does the moon shine on their planet like it does on ours? Maybe. Will we ever find out? Probably. _

_ The moon makes the atmosphere a little cold. The temperature drops at night, and it’s because the sun isn’t there to warm it up—but the moon’s got its job too. You know what else is nice about the moon? You can look at it and not go blind. And, like you, I can see it from anywhere. I can see it in my room. I can see it outside. It’s too big to miss, just like how the stars are too many to avoid. _

_ Just wanted an excuse to write to you about the moon. _

_ Here’s the real issue, star boy: Viator. Viator??? Are you serious?? That’s so...lame. It’s lame! Like, really, I appreciate the fact that you found a name, but you couldn’t come up with something better? There’s sooooo many names to choose from and—  _

“KEITH!”

Keith jolts up at the low, vibrating voice coming from outside his room. He scrambles to hide the letter and plane, putting them under the blanket and stuffing the polaroid into the pocket of his sweats.

His door opens without his consent—can he really  _ do  _ that?—and Kolivan comes fuming in, arms at his side and hands balled into fists. He wears his traditional Blade of Marmora suit, but once his eyes land on Keith, sitting up on his bed, he tears his hood off his head.

“Where  _ were  _ you?” he hisses, standing only a few feet away from his bed.

Keith says nothing. He’s too nervous to speak, and if something  _ were _ to come out of our mouth, it’d be snarky. A snarky response in this situation would not be ideal. Not with the way those endless yellow eyes seem like they’ll shoot lasers at him.

“Keith Kogane, where were you  _ this morning! _ ”

“I-I was here,” he stutters, pulling his blanket up. While this moment is terrifying, he’s living in fear of that airplane being found.

“And why didn’t you come in to watch the footage?”

Why would he? After how he was treated? His idea wasn’t held up to the standard it  _ should _ be, considering he was the one leading the mission. His idea meant discreteness, swiftness, and  _ loads _ of new information. Why were the Galra so obsessed with having to see everything? Why was Kolivan so into putting him down lately?

“This is your duty, Keith,” he continues, not even waiting for an answer. “You come in every morning to look at a few ticks of security footage. It’s  _ not _ that big of a deal! That’s all we ask you do! How you go about doing everything else is  _ entirely  _ up to you.” He inches closer to Keith, making him push his legs into his chest. “Do you know how hard the Blade of Marmora works to  _ get  _ that footage? How hard we work to find the ones worthy of your time or how much information we try to give you? Can’t you at least  _ appreciate _ it? It’s the  _ one  _ thing you do! Just one!”

Kolivan sighs heavily, freeing his clawed fingers from his fist. “Just come see the footage and I’ll maybe give you your stupid mics,” he grumbles, taking Keith’s notebook from out of his pocket and throwing it onto his lap. He storms out quickly, throwing his braid around his neck and lifting the hood over his head.

Keith scoffs. “Worked hard” to get the footage? They’re  _ in charge  _ of the footage. Kolivan is the freaking leader of the Blade of Marmora—how’s he gonna have a hard time getting something he’s in complete control of? His little speech didn’t hit Keith that much. He’ll go in to get his microphones because that’s all the help he’s most likely going to get from him. At least he has his notebook back.

Excited, he takes out the letter from under the blanket and gets back to reading.

_ —you choose that? How much time did you really give this mullet. H o w m u c h. Who suggested it? I’mma need to talk with them. Cool it means traveler but if you thought I’d accept that boi you were wrong. _

_ Therefore I have come up with something better! I think you’ll like it. How about we call this paper airplane-like thing “Diablito.” It also means traveler, but in Spanish. You know. Because English is pretty basic and Spanish is a love language and you failed it along with French and i think that’s pretty hilarious. I’d suggest we name it something in Korean but I’ve never heard you speak it so how can I trust you really know it???? Also we can’t name it something in ASL...won’t really work. Maybe when you get back to Earth we can refer to it in ASL. Too many will understand the Spanish. _

_ Diablito sounds cooler too. It’s got a little kick to it. It’s kinda perfect for a little red plane with white lining. Something tells me you can maybe care less about the name of the plane but I care very much so. _

_ Moving on! Yes, the Garrison trio is very hard to split up. We are one. Sometimes we aren’t but most of the time we are. Hunk and Pidge are obviously really close to Matt but I’m not so close. At least out in space, I wasn’t. It’s just on Earth he lives kinda far, and it’s not like I’m gonna initiate a conversation with him through text. “Hey Matt how are you i was thinking we can maybe be better friends?” lololol i love social interaction but in person, you know. And this letter writing. I like this a lot. _

_ Shiro is also very much a teacher! I was watching his class and people were falling asleep. You know he uses the board? With, like, markers. He doesn’t type it up and all that jazz. I think it’s because he likes using his prosthetic (which he got! Forgot to mention). Definitely made him a happier person in my opinion. _

_ I’ll tell him you’re not mad when I can. Some things trigger him, like many of us, and I don’t want to bring it up out of the blue with him. _

_ Alright i’mma change the mood a little bit: i’m steadily hacking into the Garrison! I am 100% crazy. And who’s to say I’m “a good kid?” I’m far from being “a good kid” shut it star boy. _

_I wasn’t going to, but it was just so tempting. I came across so much when I did it the first time. How much do you think they’re hiding? You think they’d start working on the designs I found immediately, so what’s holding them back? Think about the Kerberos mission! All the information they released was a_ _lie._ _It was far from a failed mission. What if they know about what’s out there?_

_ I started practicing hacking. That sounds so ridiculous, but I know that’s the only way I’m going to get good at it and sneak into the farther depths of the Garrison. In fact, today, I decided to hack the cafeteria system, and while my computer hasn’t spasmed and completely been obliterated, it has taken roughly over eight hours to complete! It is still going as I write this, and it’s almost midnight. Who knew there was so much information in the damn cafeteria system. _

_ Speaking of the Garrison, I’ll tell you about what could have been. Chances are they’d bring you back into flight school because uhhhh they’ve kind of given no shits about you, and for you to suddenly reappear with all this information? And your notorious impulsive actions? Yeah they don’t want you ousting it all. Hunk, Pidge, Shiro and I all have those deluxe Garrison rooms for free. It’s got a nice little kitchen with a counter and a small living room (that we all managed to install thanks to my bro). Before it was just an empty space with a single chair and a nice layout for the TV, but now we all got a big ass couch. Ideal living space. And then there’s our room! It’s just a queen bed on a little platform, and the door to the bathroom is to the side. _

_ It’s a studio dorm that’s what it is in simpler terms. _

_ On that note, I really appreciate you being open to me talking about the war. Even if you aren’t ready to talk about it, just know I’m always here to read it too. Writing to you makes things a little easier. Just...if there’s anything you don’t want me to talk about, let me know, okay? I don’t know when I’ll write to you about it, but I don’t want to mention anything you’re not comfortable with. When I’m ready, and feel the need to let it out, you’re going to be the first person to hear about it. _

_ It took about a month for this to get to me. How long has it taken for you? Figuring out the timing of this whole thing is going to be difficult, but I’m guessing we’ll be getting a letter a month? One from me, one from you. Hopefully this won’t have to go on so long. I want you back here, man. It sucks being so far away from you. We depended on each other a lot...it’s weird not having that anymore. Really, when are you coming back? Earth misses you. _

_ ((thanks for the happy birthday!!! I’m closer to legally getting wASTED)), _

_ Lancey Lance _

******

His fingers linger on his cheeks, staring down at the end of the letter in front of him.

When was the last time Keith blushed over Lance?

When! He swore he got over those bubbling feelings for Lance. He had to for his own sake. But now,  _ now, _ the fight against Zarkon is over. The fate of the universe is safe. And Keith can have a proper crush on Lance. One that he could sneakily pursue from afar. He could look at him and picture something wonderful rather than heart-wrenching.

Lance was always close but far away. Close, because the friendship they built is something Keith has never even been close to having with anyone. There’s Shiro, but his is different. They have a brotherly relationship. The one with Lance is more intimate, they’re equals. They’re vulnerable but open to advice. One person isn’t doing all the work. Far away, because they’re so different. Lance is eccentric, an extrovert at the core, a social butterfly. Keith is the exact opposite. He’s always on the DL, definitely an introvert, and despises social interaction.

And Lance is so flirty.  _ Ridiculously  _ flirty. It’s like he doesn’t know when he is and when he isn’t. There’s his  _ intentional  _ flirting, like whenever he was around alien girls and dropping dumb pickup lines frequently, and then there’s his  _ unintentional _ flirting, which is where he winks at Keith and shoots finger guns at Keith and gets all up on Keith and sincerely listens to Keith and that one time he hugged Keith when he let down his walls. Why is Lance like this! Why is he so  _ flirty,  _ why is he so  _ oblivious! _

Keith’s terrible at flirting, but when his feelings really got to him,  _ hell, _ he tried. He tried some pick-up lines, but they were all dismissed because both Keith  _ and  _ Lance are damned fools—they didn’t sound flirty  _ at all— _ and he’s even managed to give advice in the same overly-caring-but-really-profound-and-romantic tone, but nothing! Nothing at all. And sometimes it would  _ anger _ Keith. How can one boy be so fucking blind?

But something about watching the one you have feelings for from the sidelines comforted Keith. Again, Lance was just as close as he was far away, but keeping him at a distance was safe. He could admire him from afar. He picked up on his little habits and movements.

For example, Lance hunches over a little whenever he’s trying to prove a point, or when he’s making fun of someone. He’s completely natural and carefree around Hunk, often leaning on him like no big deal. His eyebrows have more movement in them than Keith does in his fingers. Lance’s best smiles are the ones he displays when no one’s really looking. They range from being a huge grin he can’t defeat to a small curve of his lips you’ll only catch if you’re close enough. His hair is curly after he showers, but once he combs it down, it stays straight for the rest of the day. He closes his eyes and speaks Spanish under his breath when he gets mad and taps his toes when he gets impatient. When he’s upset he sighs, crossing his arms and hugging himself.

But no! No, he  _ can’t _ have a damn crush on Lance. Leaving Voltron and becoming part of the Blade of Marmora helped him get  _ over _ it.  _ Not _ seeing Lance helped him get over it! And that’s because he  _ wanted _ to get over it. The feelings only returned when his eyes laid on him every now and then. Even when he came back to the team, he wasn’t caught up in them.

Therefore, having a crush on Lance at this moment is  _ not _ an ideal situation. He’s the farthest away from Lance he’s ever been. Galaxies away, as much as Keith knows.  _ Not  _ seeing Lance, and having a massive gay crush on him, is going to feel like being put through a paper shredder. He won’t be able to see the boy he’s been pining after for, geez, a year or two? It’s been on and off, but it’s definitely been a long time. He won’t be able to at least  _ try _ and become something. All he has is a pen, paper, and  _ Diablito _ to relay his message—a message that may not even get the interpretation he desires.

Curse his stupid heart. Curse his stupid heart for constricting at just the thought of Lance caring about him, at him missing Keith. Curse the Veldis Task, and curse himself for taking it up. He hasn’t gotten the knowledge he wanted from this experience. If he were back on Earth with the team, maybe they could have grown to have feelings for  _ each other. _ Maybe they could have fallen in love with each other simultaneously. Keith and Lance could have talked to each other sooner about everything that’s bottled up inside. Keith and Lance could be perfect together, they could be boyfriends— _ that’s _ what could have been.

There’s always been this little back thought in his head: Lance is straight. He’s only ever seen the guy flirt with girls, but Keith, as sequestered as he is, is confident he could change that. He’s seen him give googly eyes to alien guys before, even if he’s the only one who caught it. He just has to make him see the same thing  _ he  _ does. He wants Lance to have an attraction in men, an attraction in  _ Keith. _ Is that too much to ask for?

Maybe that’s just how he feels right  _ now, _ Keith thinks. Maybe he won’t feel this attraction the next time he gets a letter. Maybe he won’t feel it tomorrow. He’s forced himself out of love with Lance so many times because he found no future in it. Who’s to say he can’t do it again? If Keith is good at anything, it’s keeping his walls up and throwing everything he doesn’t want over them.

Keith holds his head in his hands. He doesn’t want to throw away his feelings for him again. Really, he likes liking Lance. He likes it when they interact,  _ likes  _ getting flustered. He likes being teasingly mean or hanging out with him. He likes talking to him about anything and everything. He likes admiring from afar. He likes  _ being there  _ for Lance.

Lance doesn’t like breaking down. He has to keep his head up, he has to seem unfazed because he doesn’t want to let anybody down. He makes sure that whatever is said to him doesn’t shake him to the core, doesn’t repeat in his head like a prayer, doesn’t haunt him in his dreams. But, with Keith, he lets it be known. He breaks himself into pieces and Keith takes on the task of putting them back together. Keith’s the one to tell him everything he truly is, to tell him how  _ he  _ sees how strong and level headed Lance is. God, Keith  _ wishes  _ he could be a little more like Lance. Lance knows when to let his guard down. Lance knows how to interact with others. Lance is the best leader he’s ever known. Lance is perfect in his eyes.

He slips the polaroid out of his pocket, examining it with a smile. He does, in fact, miss the moon. He misses Earth. He misses Hunk and Pidge and Shiro. Having them with him felt like family, even if he’s never really had one. And family meant home.

He misses  _ home. _

With that in mind, he gets to writing.

******

Keith stands still as the door in front of him slides up. The two screens on the sides show a blank blue slate, while the center one displays an image of a Blade. Like Kolivan, his scalp has red markings that come down his forehead in two parallel lines. Once they reached the brow bone, the lines become horizontal and end at a point. He has big, yellow eyes, much more circular than he’s seen on any Galra before. The rest of his skin is a light gray. His suit fits him like a swimsuit, the shade of dark purple, and blue lights run across where his collarbone would be. 

Kolivan maintains himself in front of the orange panel, leaning down on his hands as a figure next to him holds their hands behind their back. His head drops, he says something, and the figure turns to exit. Keith’s eyes widen as the figure gets closer.

“Sigrun?” he whispers, her features becoming more prominent as she gets closer to him. Her white hair is up in a bun, and she wears a long, collared white cape whose button slips through a singular hoop by her neck. It opens triangularly in front, showing her casual Blade of Marmora messenger uniform. It drags behind on the floor for a couple inches.

She swallows and shakes her head. She grabs onto his wrist and pulls him to the side of the doorway.

“Don’t give him a hard time right now,” she warns, rubbing her right upper arm.

“Who’s that guy on the screen?” Keith asks, scanning her face for answers behind his mask.

Her lips shake as the next words come out of her mouth. “His name was Thorynx Atsu. He was found dead this morning in the materials factory.”

_ “Dead?”  _ Keith repeats. “Like, from old age? Sickness?”

“They doubt it’s because of either of those. An autopsy still has to be taken and everything…”

Keith bites his lip. There’s been seven months of placidity on the surface, but if Thorynx was murdered, then everything the Blade of Marmora thought has been false. This rebel group  _ could _ exist.

But no,  _ nope,  _ Keith has to stop jumping to conclusions. A Blade could have killed Thorynx, or it  _ was _ sickness or old age.

Keith crosses his arms. “Hey, you okay?” he asks Sigrun. Her face is laced with worry, making her look older than she already is. Her thin eyebrows furrow in and up as she looks away from Keith.

“I should be, it’s just…” Her voice fades.

“Did you know him?”

Sigrun nods. “It’s not that we weren’t on good terms, it’s just we weren’t...on  _ bad _ terms either.” She shudders. “I’ll be fine. Thanks, Keith. Uhm, you should wear the white cape in your closet.”

Keith gives her a questioning look. He knew about its existence, but always ignored it. He only ever needed the uniform and sleepwear.

“White capes are traditionally worn for mourning,” she explains. “Fact number three.”

She walks off, leaving Keith behind. He readies himself to face Kolivan in his current state. The door slides up once more, and he takes his first steps in. The elder doesn’t react—he stays with his head down, his shoulders raised up to his ears. His strand of hair isn’t braided, so it runs down his shoulder blade like waves.

Quietly, Keith walks up the platform and stands next to him. He looks up at the photo of Thorynx. He seems to be about Kolivan’s age—youth erased but replaced with intolerable experience.

“I’m sorry for your loss,” he sympathizes. He isn’t sure whether to physically comfort him or not, especially after what went down yesterday.

“We’re installing cameras  _ tonight, _ ” he edicts, not looking up once. Keith is disappointed, but he doesn’t find it in him to argue. “Your microphones will be a plan B. I won’t let this slide.”

“I understand,” Keith appeals.

“You won’t be coming along. I’ll have other members do it. I want you thinking up of ideas on how to uncover this radical group so that we can eradicate them. Do whatever it takes.”

Keith stays, thinking of something off the top of his head. Thorynx, letters,  _ Diablito, _ Sigrun, polaroids, the moon, home—all words that pop up first.

_ Home. _ It’s far, but when it was close by, it wasn’t on any planet.

It was in a castle.

******

Eyes peek into the messaging office, where Keith sees Sigrun leaning back on her chair and gazing at the ceiling. The fluorescent lights in the waiting area before bounce off the walls, but where Sigrun resides, they’re dimmed to a golden yellow. 

“You busy?” he asks, taking Sigrun out of her daydreaming. She turns her head towards him and slowly rises up.

“Super,” she replies sarcastically, freeing her hair from her bun. “What do you need?”

Keith slides into the office, making sure his white coat’s tail makes it into the room. Once the door behind him is closed, he releases his mask and walks towards the counter. “Help.”

She rolls forward to her desk. “Hm, I’m intrigued.” Sigrun places her elbows on it and rests her chin in her palms.

“So, communication is forbidden, right?” he lightly mentions.

She catches on quickly. “I’m not helping you,” she deadpans.

“No, no, Sigrun please!” Keith begs, holding his own two hands and looking at her solemnly.

“I’m already doing some illegal airplane thing for you,” she complains, rolling her eyes, “what else do you need?”

He takes a deep breath. He’s thought about this for hours, and has decided that if there’s anyone else he’d trust on this planet, it’d be Sigrun. She’s already doing something she  _ definitely _ doesn’t have to, but continues to do so for Keith. “The reason Kolivan calls me in every morning is because he has me working on something confidential,” he begins to explain. “There’s something fishy going on in Veldis, and with Thorynx’s death, the condition of it is heightened. While he’s giving me good information in these morning meetings, it’s not enough, and he’s not going to help me much. In fact, he  _ probably  _ wants me as far away from him as possible right now.”

Sigrun seems unentertained.

“Which leads to the main topic here!” he continues, hoping his tone is somewhat more convincing than before. “To get the help I need, I’m going to have to contact other planets. And to do that, I need your help.”

“How do you know people in other planets?” she asks.

“Valid question!” he exclaims, thrusting his palms out to her. “I was part of Voltron and we liberated a shit ton of planets! I happen to know many of the rulers and such.”

She sighs. Sigrun’s contemplating the outcomes. “Are you going to bother me with this?”

“Yes very much so.”

“Then I’ll do it under  _ one  _ condition.”

“Nothing too extreme,” Keith doesn’t forget to mention.

“You tell me why that airplane thing is so important to you.”

Keith’s face rises in temperature. That’s not something he exactly wants to share, especially because of how he’s been feeling. Those feelings he thought would go away haven’t done that, and it’s messing with him. But it wouldn’t hurt to share it a  _ little, _ would it? He can show his excitement around  _ one _ person.

“Fine,” Keith caves in. “The letters in it are from someone really important to me back on Earth.”

“So like your dad?” she guesses. “Teacher? Sibling?”

“Friend.”

“Oh, you  _ liar, _ ” she sneers, laughing a little and crossing her arms. “A friend? Really? You answered so quickly I don’t believe it. I’ve been alive long enough to know that.”

“He’s just a friend,” Keith mumbles and frowns.

“I hope your taste in men isn’t disappointing.”

“It  _ isn’t,  _ he’s very cute,” he defends.

Keith’s eyes go wide at the words that come out of his mouth. He hasn’t even admitted it to himself yet. Well, he’s  _ always  _ known Lance was cute, and oozed sex appeal like it was his fucking superpower, but he’s never decided to come to terms with it by saying it out loud. Not in a while at least. Only Shiro knew he had a crush on someone! Or maybe others did, they just didn’t say anything! Oh no, what if team Voltron knew? Or Lance himself? No, nope,  _ impossible.  _ Lance is oblivious and his friends are too mean to let him know. Point is, if someone  _ were _ to say his “taste in men is disappointing,” then he’d shut them up immediately, because Lance is far from disappointing in just about every way. 

Sigrun’s jaw drops, an opened-mouth smile taking over. “That’s good enough for me!” She’s clearly excited. Keith doubts she’s heard anything nearly as interesting as his current crush situation in years, and now that it’s here, she has all the time in the world to hear about it. He smiles. He’s never been too open about his crush on Lance and telling Sigrun may ease him. His feelings about him have always been bottled up, but he couldn’t unscrew the lid to Lance. Keith isn’t going to confess to him, not yet at least. Maybe not ever. But unscrewing the lid for Sigrun is a good idea. 

“Wow, Keith, I’m always here to listen to you ramble about a cute boy if you ever need to let it go.” She stretches her arms and cracks her fingers. “You’ve earned yourself a Galra fact. Since we’re on the topic of other planets, Galra fact number four: we hate Alteans!”

“Cool,” Keith says, grabbing the ends of the counter and leaning in. “Can you get me in contact with the Castle of Lions?”

******


	4. the heist

The end of August means the beginning of school, and Lance is mentally preparing himself for the year. He received his schedule two days ago, and he had to be up and ready to go to his first class: planetary science. It was a science he had never even heard of until he  _ got  _ to the Garrison, and when he told his mom about it, she flipped. She practically begged him to take the class because no one’s ever really studied it anywhere but the Garrison.

He’s going to try his best to hold back.

There’s  _ way _ more planets than those textbooks know about, but if he says anything, he’ll most likely be ridiculed. After that, he’ll have to suffer through his calculus class, which he enjoys  _ doing _ but hates  _ learning. _ Then, thankfully, he’s a teacher’s assistant to Shiro. That’s the class he’s most excited for, because not only does he do nothing, but he gets to mess around with his space dad’s students. Lance likes to make himself known throughout the school, and since the class he’s assisting is filled with new kids, it’s an easy way to start his reputation. Then, he has to sit through astronomy (which, after a year and a half in space, should be a piece of cake).

Unfortunately, Lance, Hunk, and Pidge were put into flight class once again. Lance loves flying—he  _ really, really _ loves it—but it all changed for him after Voltron. They couldn’t switch out of flight school and it’s an essential class. Every Garrison student has to take it at least once, no matter what school you’re in. They’ve been promised that they won’t be flying anything again, but they know Iverson is going to make them go through flight simulations. Chances are, it’s to show the new kids what teamwork  _ doesn’t _ look like, but those tables will turn. Lastly, he has Hunk with him in astrophysics. Having Hunk in his class is always the best—it means he’ll have fun and never be bored.

Lance glares at the uniform that hangs in his closet. He hasn’t worn that orange and white thing since the day Blue flew him out into space. There’s no point in lying, he’s nervous. It should still fit him, right? Yeah, he gained some muscle, but he still fits in all the clothes he left behind. In fact, that army green jacket never outgrew him.

Lance slips on the uniform, zipping up the jacket and squeezing into his shoes. He needs new ones. He’s had these since he first  _ got  _ into the Garrison.

He quickly fixes his hair and heads out the door. Down the hall, Hunk and Pidge await, smiling bigger than ever. It immediately passes onto him and he’s throwing his arms over both their shoulders. “Garrison trio, back in the Garrison!” Lance cheers, ruffling Pidge’s hair a little.

“I wish I could be in other classes with you guys,” she sighs as they walk out the dorms together. “Not just flight class.”

“Well, you  _ are  _ younger than us,” Hunk chimes in, stuffing his hands in his pockets, “which automatically puts you in a different year.”

“Yeah but I’m  _ smarter _ than both of you combined.”

“Hey!” Hunk and Lance complain in unison.

Lance stops walking, putting his hand on his chest and gaping towards his best friend. “I’m offended.”

Pidge laughs and grabs his arm, pulling him back in line with them. “My first class of the day is stats. How ‘bout you two?”

“I’ve got planetary science,” Lance answers, “but Hunk has a more  _ interesting  _ class.”

Hunk chuckles. “I want her to guess it.”

Pidge hums in thought as the trio walks out into campus, where hundreds of kids hang around. All the new kids are crowding around the administrators, trying to snag a map of the Garrison. It’s burning hot outside and Lance can feel the sweat start to build up in his uniform. He scrunches his eyes as the sun hits them.

“It isn’t, like, a  _ class-class, _ right?” she asks, using her hand to block away the sun from her glasses. “Because if it was, you would have told me.”

“Nah, but it’s going to give me more insight than any other class we’ve ever had,” Hunk hints at.

“All the classes here suck, can you just tell me?”

They walk into Hall A, where their lockers are magically next to each other. Hunk fails to hide his grin. “Given up so easily?”

“Hunk, I did too,” Lance admits, not wanting him to provoke Pidge and send her into a reel of guesses. “Just tell her.”

Hunk leans forward and turns towards Pidge, who is at the right of Lance as they walk. She stares intently at him, which the middle boy finds funny. “I’m TA-ing for Iverson,” Hunk reveals.

Pidge’s jaw drops. Lance had the exact reaction, just with a couple of punches to Hunk’s arm being added.  _ No one  _ was ever chosen to be a teacher’s assistant to Iverson. To be one, it meant you had to be exceptionally good and well-liked. Hunk, it turns out, happens to be the only one in their grade level who fits that standard.

Which, they both debated, was very wrong. How could  _ Hunk  _ be it? He hasn’t been to school in two years. There had to be someone else!

Pidge begins walking backwards to face Hunk. He smiles and holds his head high while Lance just makes sure she doesn’t bump into anything. 

“Hunk—wow—do you know what this means?” she asks, raising her hands in the air and throwing her head back in laughter.

“I’m important,” Hunk proudly says.

“It means  _ Iverson _ is kissing  _ ass!” _ she laughs. They get to their lockers right at that moment and begin to unlock. “He’s kissing  _ your  _ ass!”

Lance looks at Hunk, who seems hurt and very confused. He shrugs. Lance’s locker is to the left of Pidge’s, while Hunk’s is to the right.

“W-What do you mean ‘kissing ass?’” Hunk asks. “For one,  _ I  _ don’t think he’s—”

Pidge’s chuckle interrupts his sentence. “Hunk,  _ he’s _ the one who told the whole country that we’re definitely dead, after all that fundraising to find us. Then we came back alive and it hurt his ego and reputation. So, he gave us deluxe Garrison dorm rooms and the promise that we’ll never have to go out into space again. He  _ knows  _ that isn’t enough! So, he took the kindest of us three and made him his little assistant! If you tell potential employers that you were an assistant to  _ Iverson,  _ they’ll have a brawl to snag you up.”

Lance glares at Hunk over Pidge’s small height. The other continues to look down at Pidge, who is steadily getting out the supplies she needs for her first class.

Her argument makes perfect sense. Iverson’s been trying to kiss up to them since they got back, to makeup for the year and a half that he spent lying to the general public and to their families. The best effort he’s really done is the deluxe rooms. Besides that, he’s pretty much failed. All they really want is for their very true story to be taken as the honest truth. It shouldn’t have to be something they “believe” happened. Of course the whole thing sounds a little ridiculous, but it’s what happened. They can’t even come up with a lie that will compensate for how long they were gone. The only answer is that they saved the universe.

“I think she’s right,” Lance admits, digging out his notebook and picking a loose pencil that’s rolling around in his locker. “Iverson knows we don’t like him. He’s trying his best to change that.” He shuts his locker and leans against it, frowning at Hunk. He’s taking the news well, but he’s lost the ecstatic pride he had a few minutes ago.

“Don’t be so sad, science guy,” Pidge comforts, nudging his side. “Use this to your advantage! Take some notes, see how he acts. You know us. We love a little exploitation.”

The first bell rings, signaling students to start heading towards their first class. Hunk nods firmly as he closes his locker, then gives the two of them a smile. “I don’t like the guy anyways,” Hunk says. “I’ll let you know  _ everything. _ ”

Lance and Pidge whoop in excitement. They all start heading their own way, but Lance doesn’t forget to remind them to meet at Shiro’s room by the end of the day. When in space, they always met up at the end of a day or mission and talked. Whether it be about the battle or not, it became tradition. Now that they’re back on Earth, they weren’t going to let a slight location change mess that up. Once school ends, tradition will continue in Shiro’s classroom.

******

Lance plops himself down on a student desk. Hunk takes up the empty teacher’s seat behind Mr. Shirogane’s desk and spins around. Shiro wipes his board clean and whistles a nice tune. Pidge comes striding in a few seconds later, groaning loudly with her back hunched and feet dragging. It catches all their attention rather quickly.

“Everyone’s  _ dumb! _ ” she complains, slowly getting down on her knees and falling flat on the floor. Her arms sprawl around her and she turns her head to the left, looking up to Lance. Her eyes squint behind those glasses she doesn’t need. “Jesus, Shiro, why’s it so bright in here?”

“Sun is out,” Shiro answers, coming around to squat in front of her, “and curtains are up, as you should be. What’s up?”

Pidge rolls over and sits up, adjusting herself so she leans against the desk. Hunk gets up and moves towards the desk Lance sits on, pulling out the chair with his foot and sitting. She lets out a puff of air and pushes her glasses up. “Kids in my class won’t stop making fun of me for the whole Voltron stuff. I mean, it’s nothing new, but it doesn’t change the fact that it’s super annoying.”

“Same happened to me today,” Lance chimes in. “Some guy tried cracking a joke about me being the head.”

Pidge snorts. “Was it funny?”

“No it was a fucking awful joke. These kids don’t know humor.”

“Alright, how about everyone else’s day?” Shiro asks. The sun from the windows gleams down nicely on his face and glistens through his white chunk of hair. His figure is so big that it shades Pidge on his side, making the smaller one content. She didn’t need anymore freckles, she always said.

“Planetary science has the  _ biggest  _ textbook,” Lance starts, scavenging for something to compare it with. “Think Shiro’s biceps.”

“My biceps aren’t that big—”

“Are you  _ serious! _ ” Pidge exclaims, grabbing Shiro’s wrist and pulling it over her head. “That thing  _ has  _ to be thick.”

“Shiro, flex,” Hunk kindly demands with a grin.

“Lance is just over exaggerating,” Shiro claims, seating himself on the floor.

“I am definitely not,” Lance fights back.

“Flex!” Hunk and Pidge chant. “Flex! Flex! Flex!”

Shiro rolls his eyes again and flexes. Pidge tries to ring her thumb and index finger around his bicep, but fails. “I don’t think I’d even be able to carry that book!”

“I’ll show it to you when we get to my locker,” Lance promises an excited Pidge.

“Why’s it so big?” Hunk asks, leaning back on his hands.

“Just a ton of stuff about planets and solar systems,” he says, “and planets in other solar systems, and how all those things came to be, et cetera, et cetera.” Lance stretches his arms over his head. “Besides that, all I can say is I’m blessed to have Hunk in astrophysics, we’re all going to hate flight class, and Shiro’s kids are assholes.”

Pidge and Hunk wait for the elder to lash back and defend his younglings, but when he does nothing but avoid their stares, they jump in surprise.

“Takashi Shirogane, not protecting his students from the harsh opinions of Lance Sanchez?” Hunk gasps, as if he’s a commentator. “Are we in the correct reality?”

“Well, Hunk, after all the ugly truths we told him about his summer school students, and his oath to see them as innocent creatures, you  _ think  _ he’d keep up with that persona!” Pidge chimes in, pretending she’s his co-host or something. “Has Mr. Shirogane finally, dare we say, decided to not put all of his students on a pedestal and see them as deranged hormonal teenagers that are usually up to no good and have not a single care in the world for the class he is teaching? We go to Lance, who has more information on the recent findings.”

The two of them extend their fists out towards him, like they’re holding microphones. “Yes, Pidge and Hunk, I  _ do  _ believe what you’re saying is right,” Lance fits right into the play. Shiro, ultimately, looks annoyed, but is very much happy with the show his friends are putting on. “I am a teacher’s assistant for Mr. Shirogane, and his new students do not indeed have a single care in the world for the class he is teaching. They’re constantly chattering over the teacher and are only looking forward to their flight class. Unfortunately for them, they’ll realize too late that the class he is teaching, which is aeronautical engineering,  _ is essential for flight school! _ The newest generation, I am saddened to report, is hopeless.”

“Woah, wait, I didn’t know you were teaching aeronautical engineering!” Hunk exclaims, breaking up the act they put together. “That’s so cool! Congrats man!”

“Thank you, Hunk,” Shiro says, “but Lance is right. The kids in that class don’t care at all. They were rude to me and didn't listen. I’m not one to usually exercise my authority in the classroom too obviously, but for that class, I think I’ll have to.”

“So you’re other classes  _ aren’t  _ like that one?” Lance asks, now wishing he was assisting a different class.

“No, the other classes are all three and five year students. Most of them either know me or know  _ of  _ me.”

“These kids haven’t heard the legends of Takashi Shirogane!” Pidge is taken aback by the realization. “I’m not much older than them, what the hell are they learning!”

“Well, that’s why Lance is there to assist me,” Shiro smirks. 

Those kids  _ did  _ scare Lance. The moment he entered class, it felt like his house on Christmas Eve—all his extended family dancing and conversing in the living room as kids scream down the stairs and Lance just tries sip his hot chocolate in peace. All these kids were new, but they  _ knew _ each other, and they  _ knew _ how to disrupt a class. He glanced at Shiro the moment he saw his beautiful classroom looking like a circus and tried to comfort him as best as he could. His friend was nervous as hell, but it wasn’t Lance who had to keep an eye out on them. In fact, he decided against trying to make himself known to these kids. They’d rip him to shreds.

“Totally,” Lance fakely assures. He turns towards Hunk. “Speaking of assisting, how did Iverson’s go?”

Hunk rubs his palms together, pursing his lips and giving each of them an exciting look. “Wow, do  _ I  _ got a story to tell.” He rises from his seat and heads toward the door. Stopping in front, he spins and motions Lance, Shiro, and Pidge to make room. Pidge takes Hunk’s seat while Shiro decides to lean against the windows.

“So before I enter, I give myself a pep talk,” Hunk begins. “I’m like, ‘okay Hunk, even if he  _ is  _ kissing up, you gotta make it seem like you don’t know this. Like you’re just kind, cool, Hunk, you know? Your mommas  _ raised _ you to be like this—’”

“Get to the point,” Pidge groans.

Hunk nods. “So I enter the room, and I look around, and I know no one!” He points towards the board. “But Iverson is standing  _ right there, _ and I can’t make myself look nervous, so I give him my signature smile.” Hunk puts his hand under his chin and showcases his signature smile. No teeth, just a kind smile that stretches ear to ear. “He gives no reaction. Instead, he points at a desk in the corner of the room. Now, I know that’s meant for me, because I talked to people who had a TA in Iverson’s class before, and they all said they sit in a little desk in the corner. So I walk towards it.” Hunk walks from the door to the right corner of the room, passing in front of them. He rolls Shiro’s desk chair to the corner and sits.

“Pretend there’s a desk here,” Hunk adds, motioning with his hands an invisible desk above his thighs. “Anyways, class begins, and I realize I have no idea what I’m even TA-ing for! All he’s doing is introducing himself and whatever. But then!” Hunk gets up from his seat and walks towards the board. Everyone’s eyes follow him, very engaged in the story. Hunk knows how to add a flair for the dramatic. “Iverson is like, ‘Flight school at the Garrison is difficult. You all know what you signed up for. You must now experience what it feels like to fly. To the simulation station.’”

All their jaws drop. Iverson teaches a couple of classes besides the flight simulation, which is what he’s widely known for teaching and being the best at, but no one’s ever  _ assisted _ him in that. He hardly ever calls on a  _ pilot _ to even assist him. For him to have Hunk do so is incredulous.

Hunk runs back to his invisible desk. “So I’m here with a face that reads ‘what the fuck’ but everyone else is like ‘yeah okay lead the way’ and then Iverson looks at my petrified face and—get  _ this— _ grins. Like-like—” Hunk points at his lips and shows them something that looks more like a sneer, but in a nice way.

“That’s gross,” Lance says, crossing his arms. “But I guess that’s Iverson’s ‘kissing up’ face.”

“So the whole class, including me, is taken to the simulation station, and they’re all super excited, which means they’re newbies. I’m standing back, because every sane person knows to give Iverson his time to shine in the simulation station, but then he begins to _introduce_ me.” Hunk rolls his chair back behind Shiro’s desk and slams his hands down. “So in _that_ moment, my face is even more ‘what the fuck’ and all these new kids are looking at me and you guys know how easily intimidated I get so I’m freaking out and, I don’t know, I guess Iverson asked me something but I had stopped listening. Once the silence registered and I saw everyone looking at me, I turned to Iverson and, oh boy, guess what he said.”

“Get in the simulation,” Shiro guesses first.

“Daeng,” Hunk imitates a buzzer sound.

“Tell them about Voltron?” Pidge inquires.

“Daeng daeng daeng.  _ Very _ wrong.”

“Talk about the last time you were in the simulation,” Lance guesses, “and how we sucked and you threw up in the gearbox.”

“Daeng, he told the class that on his own.”

His friends blink at him out of ideas. Hunk sighs. “He said, ‘Teach them how to use it.’”

“The simulator?” Shiro concerningly asks.

“Yeah! He had me do everything  _ he  _ does. How to work the simulator, what every button is, the different scenarios, the whole shebang! I was so confused, man! Like, I knew what I was doing, but I wasn’t sure why he was having me do it! Am I supposed to be proving something to him? Is he trying to make me like him? What is he setting me up for?”

“Is that it?” Pidge asks. “He just let you teach his class?”

“When the bell rang, he gave me a pat on the back.”

The room explodes. Lance jumps off the desk and raises his arms above his head. Pidge gets up and paces back and forth, mumbling, and Shiro stops leaning against the window and crosses his arms, saying something under his breath. Hunk nods at the commotion, understanding the reaction.

“Iverson would only give freaking  _ God _ a pat on the back!” Lance yells, thrusting his arms at his best friend. “And Iverson isn’t meeting God anytime soon ‘cause he’s going  _ straight  _ to fucking hell.”

“I have to agree.” Pidge pauses, then glares at Hunk. “Are you God, Hunk?”

“Last time I checked, no,” Hunk answers.

Pidge grabs the edge of the desk. “Then  _ how _ is he just gonna give you a pat on the back! Not even the team that lived on Mars for two months got a pat on the back!”

“They got paid, like, a hundreds of thousands of dollars. I’d rather get that than a pat on the back.”

“Okay, but what if they got that  _ and  _ a pat on the back!” Pidge argues. “Iverson is  _ legendary,  _ even though he has a terrible personality. Like, ahhh, think of someone legendary prick from history, quick, anybody.”

“Fidel Castro,” Lance says.

“Someone less notorious,” Pidge says, looking over her shoulder to him. “A little more ancient and a little less Cuban.” Lance grins at her.

“Cleopatra,” Shiro suggests.

“Uh, I can work with that,” Pidge says. “Okay, getting a pat on the back from Iverson is like being Cleopatra’s lover.”

“Bad example,” Hunk admits, expressing a sour face, “someone say someone else.”

“Aristotle,” Lance picks from the top of his head.

“No philosophers,” Pidge groans. “Too complicated.”

“George Washington?” Shiro asks.

“God, no, not an American, Shiro.” She looks at Hunk. “You know of any cool Samoans?”

“No, not really,” Hunk whispers, a little ashamed.

“I’ve got it!” Pidge lights up. “Getting a pat on the back from Iverson is like being a student of Leonardo Da Vinci.”

“Oh, so the Italian can choose an Italian but  _ the Cuban  _ had to think of someone a little less Cuban and a little more ancient,” Lance complains.

“My argument is valid,” Pidge smiles, straightening up. “Da Vinci is legendary because he was one of the most valued people of the Renaissance, painted the damn  _ Mona Lisa,  _ and had such a futuristic scientific lookout! But he had, like, six students or something. Da Vinci didn’t just choose  _ anybody, _ like how Iverson doesn’t just pat  _ anybody’s _ back. You gotta  _ be  _ something!”

“Look, I know getting a pat on the back from Iverson is strange and all,” Hunk says, “but I think you’re all making a big deal about it. I-I mean, Shiro, buddy, you’ve gotten a pat on the back, right?”

Shiro scoffs, rolling his eyes. “I should, but I don’t know anyone that has.”

Hunk’s jaw drops. 

“Well, that settles it!” Lance says, clapping his hands. “Team Voltron That Is Currently On Earth are going to get their ass kissed by Iverson, and Hunk is our first victim!”

******

Shiro turns on the air conditioner and grabs some water bottles from his little refrigerator in the corner. Lance sprawls himself across several desks, legs wide and arms open. Hunk stands in front of the AC, taking all it has, and Pidge sits at the end of Shiro’s desk with her Garrison jacket over her head to cool her down. The August heat was getting to them, and being in the middle of the desert didn’t help their situation one bit. Lance  _ grew up  _ in heat—he was born and raised in Cuba for twelve years, where it was hot practically year round, then he moved to Arizona, where it’s usually pretty hot, and now he’s at the Garrison, which is in the middle of some Texan mountain desert. The sun just  _ loved _ him.

“How did Iverson’s go today?” Shiro asks Hunk, handing him a water bottle. Hunk takes it happily.

“Same as yesterday,” he answers, voice echoing through the air, “but I got to do less. Iverson does the yelling, I just kindly remind students of what to do.”

“Are they  _ twats? _ ” Lance asks, moving his head back to look at Hunk. “Because Shiro’s kids are  _ nightmares. _ ”

“Do tell, Sanchez,” Pidge says.

He scoffs. Honestly, he thought these kids would be a little nicer today, but he was very wrong. He hopes his little brother Adrian doesn’t follow in their footsteps. “In case you didn’t know, Mr. Shirogane doesn’t really sit in class,” he mentions, taking the water bottle from Shiro’s hand, “so I sit in his chair and do my own thing.”

“He played a video game the whole class,” Shiro adds.

“Shut up,” he quickly says. “Anyways, Shiro’s up there going over the textbook and I’m observing these kids. They’re not paying attention, and as students, we get that, but this is  _ fucking  _ flight school! You wanna fly into space? You gotta learn all  _ this  _ shit. After the textbook—Shiro’s  _ such  _ an old teacher—he asks everyone to introduce themselves.”

“That’s not old,” Shiro fights, sitting in his teacher’s desk with a cold water bottle to his forehead.

“Pretty old, dude,” Hunk’s voice echoes through the vents.

“As I was saying,” Lance comes back, “they start battling out who’s richer and all. Who’s got this, who’s got that, and it’s like, who asked? Shiro just wanted your name and why you want to be in flight school!”

“Kids will be kids,” Pidge sighs.

“That’s not all,” Shiro groans.

Lance sits up and drinks some of his water. “So I’m upset about it but don’t do  _ anything _ to provoke these newbies—”

“You rolled your eyes and groaned.”

Lance turns his head towards Shiro, who’s giving him a narrowed look and is still disappointed in him about today. Shiro insists that he’s to blame for the problem that occurred in class.

“Okay, so I rolled my eyes and groaned,” Lance confesses, falling back on the desks, “because these kids are spoiled brats and my ears wanted to combust every time they opened their  _ mouth,  _ and the person who was talking at the moment caught me doing it, and, well, things didn’t end well.”

“‘Things didn’t end well?’” Shiro repeats, keeping a calm posture as best as he can. Lance turns his head over to him and gulps. “Elaborate for us, will you?”

Pidge and Hunk glance nervously at their friend. “I…” Lance begins, tripping over what to say next, “I got in an argument with your student?”

“ _ Elaborate. _ ”

“I got in an argument with Henrik Belfor, your new student.”

“Lance, if you don’t tell Hunk and Pidge what you did in my class, I’m going to call up your mom and tell her,” he threatens. 

“No need!” Lance reassures, sitting up quickly and throwing his legs over the edge of a desk. Okay, it wasn’t  _ that _ bad. No need to call up his mom. “ _ Ya estoy haciendo algo que yo no debe que hacer, _ ” he whispers under his breath. He takes a couple deep breathes. “I rolled my eyes and groaned and Henrik saw and called me out. He asked me why I did that, and I gave him my honest answer: because he was annoying—”

“No,” Shiro says, leaning back and crossing his arms, “you said ‘because you’re  _ all  _ brats.’ And then the whole class got up and rallied around the room.”

“You’re missing the best part, Shiro,” Lance laughs, crossing his legs. “The kids who  _ aren’t _ spoiled brats got up and spoke for themselves, and the last two minutes a fight broke out.”

A silence evolves between the group. Shiro is staring down Lance, who is trying to keep a positive demeanor, and Hunk and Pidge figure out what to say next. Lance, for some reason, feels pressure. In some ways, yes, it’s his fault, but the students were the ones who started the fight. They were fighting about their riches before it got physical.

“Did you record it?” Hunk breaks the quietness.

“Nah, I should have though,” Lance sighs disappointingly.

“Then what’s the point?” Pidge says, fiddling with the sleeves of her jacket that frame her small face.

“Why do you kids always record fights?” Shiro tried to reason. “There’s no point in  _ that. _ ”

“Well,” Lance interjects, “if I whipped out my phone, one of three things could have happened: one of those twats would have broke my phone,  _ Shiro _ would get mad at me, or his students would roast my phone.”

“Why would they roast your phone?” Shiro rolls his eyes.

Lance takes out his phone from his pocket. “This thing is old! They probably got the new phone model that came out last week.”

They all let out a tired laugh and reside in silence. It isn’t awkward; they’ve spent enough time with each other to be in the same room and ignore one another and still feel fine. At first, it was awkward, but things changed when their battles got harder. Sometimes they’d lose too many allies, and they’d sit in the castle mutely. They kind of had conversations with one another in their head, because they knew what would be said if they spoke. The next day, they all thought the same thing when training or fighting. Voltron wasn’t only a robot, no, it was a team, it was one single mind. Voltron is gone now, but that essence lingers.

Lance looks over to Shiro. He took out his laptop and has his glasses on. He glares at the screen, not moving his fingers, with the same blank face. Hunk and Pidge look through their phones.

“What’s up, Shiro?” Lance asks, straightening his back. Shiro looks at him with the same expression he held before. “Seeing something you don’t like?”

“Uh, um,” Shiro says, blinking and taking his glasses off, “yeah, yeah, something I don’t like. Lance, do you remember the day your mom came by and offered me food?”

“Your mom came by?” Hunk asks, putting his phone away. 

Lance nods, remembering why he hadn’t known. He’s not that mad about it anymore. His mom came down anyways, it was  _ good _ he didn’t go up north with them.

“Why didn’t you tell us?” Pidge gasps. “Wait, did she make  _ ropa vieja? _ ”

“You two were visiting Matt.” Lance looks back and smile at Shiro. “And yes she did.”

Hunk and Pidge curse under their breaths. Lance tries to hide his smile.

“Anyways, you know how I was busy with something Iverson had me do?” Shiro continues. “Well, I did it, and sent it, and now I’ve got my feedback on it. Well, not exactly  _ feedback.  _ He just sent me a whole message about me doing everything wrong and how my work, in no way, will help our latest experiments.” He puts his head in his hands, shaking his head. “I don’t know what I did wrong.”

While Lance should be concerned about his friend’s concerns, “latest experiments” caught most of his attention. He hasn’t done any hacking this week, mainly because he had to focus on getting back in school mode. After he had successfully hacked into the cafeteria system, all he got was basic student and teacher ID info and recipes of their food (which would taste good if they used decent ingredients). Lance’s ultimate hacking goal is Iverson and the Garrison’s secret files, but he knows he’s got to start little first.

And “little,” by Lance’s standards, is what he first started hacking: designs and measurements. The Aircraft Designing Department. They're bound to have something on these “latest experiments.”

“What  _ are _ the latest experiments?” Lance asks, praying to God he gets something out of this. “I should let my mom know.”

“That shuttle they’re working on,” Shiro says. “It’s their main project and all the Garrison is focused on. You’ve heard about it—everyone  _ knows _ the project. What I did for Iverson was for it, but that’s all the Garrison has.”

“What was your work about?”

“Engineering aspects of it. Which motors are best and types of metals to use. Iverson said my choices were ‘moronic’ and that he expected better from ‘someone who claims to have been stuck in space for years.’” Shiro curls his finger quotations back into his fist. He scoffs and looks at the kids in his room.

“You better punch the fuck out of him tomorrow, Hunk,” Pidge says, putting her jacket back on.

“Is that it?” Lance asks. They all turn their head towards him, each giving the same confused look. “Is that all the Garrison is working on?”

A moment of silence ensues. The all look at each other and Lance is starting to get nervous.

“No, I’m sure there’s more,” Shiro answers. “Why are you so interested?”

Lance laughs fakely. He hasn’t been interested in anything the Garrison has done since he came back. Hacking is the only thing that awakened an interest—no, a  _ need _ —to learn everything about the school. “I-I’m a Garrison student! It’s good to know what’s up and all.”

“Lance, you can care  _ less _ about what the Garrison is working on,” Hunk mentions.

“I just want to know!” Lance fights. This doesn’t look like it’s heading a good direction. He should have faked an interest earlier. “Like, c’mon, Shiro.” Lance looks towards him. “They  _ got  _ to be working on more than one thing! Are they hiding it from us? Do only you important people know about it?”

“The Garrison isn’t building  _ anything _ else,” Shiro says, standing up and walking towards him. “Why are you so interested?”

“I-It’s good to know, like I said!” Lance’s hand starts to shake, and he grabs onto it before his friends see it. “But are you  _ sure _ there’s nothing else?”

“He said no,” Pidge says firmly. “Really, why do you care? I don’t even care.”

Lance looks into Shiro’s gaze. He knows something’s up—everyone in the  _ room _ unfortunately caught on—and he’s doing his best to figure it out. “Really, all I wanted was to just know,” Lance smiles. It is time to go. Time to go  _ fast. _ “Well, I had fun!” He jumps down from the desk, awkwardly putting his hand on Shiro’s broad shoulder. “See you tomorrow!”

He shuffles towards the door. Once outside, he runs to his dorm.

******

Lance is the last to get to Shiro’s room the next day. Right when he opens the door, Shiro, Hunk, and Pidge stand in front of him in their Garrison uniforms. Shiro crosses his arms, Hunk has his hands in his pockets, and Pidge pushes her glasses up the bridge of her nose. Lance feels like he’s done something wrong. Is this what it would feel like if they found out about  _ Diablito? _ What was the purpose of his best friends looking like they’re about to jump him?

“Hi,” Lance says, closing the door behind him.

They say nothing. They just continue to look at him.

“Am I missing something?” he asks, twisting his hands in the air. “What’d I do this time?”

No answer.

Lance walks around them, taking up Shiro’s desk seat. The three of them turn towards him. “Okay, what is this, a horror film? You all haunted triplets or something?”

“Why were you so hung up about what the Garrison is doing?” Pidge breaks at last.

“‘Hung up?’” Lance repeats. “What constitutes me being ‘hung up’ on something?”

“You kept asking about it,” she answers.

“No I didn’t,” Lance says. Did he  _ really  _ act different? Yeah, his exit was forced, but he thinks he did pretty okay. “I just wanted to know!”

“Lance, I’ve known you since you couldn’t understand a lick of English,” Hunk says, inching closer to the desk. Lance leans back nervously. “When you’re hung up on something, you give the same reason without any explanation. And then when we ask you why, you dodge the question as much as possible.” Hunk takes his hands out of his pockets and places them on the desk. “So  _ why  _ were you so  _ hung up _ on what the Garrison is doing?”

“I-I was  _ not _ ,” Lance defends. He can’t oust himself out. Hell, Shiro  _ works _ for the Garrison! He can’t tell him he’s trying to crumble the ones who gave him a  _ job _ . “Really, I’m not—I  _ wasn’t _ —hung up on this! I mean, that!”

_ Great. _ Now he’s messing up his lines.

“Past tense or present tense?” Pidge asks, crossing her arms.

“Past tense!” Lance says. “Leave me alone, English is my second language.”

“Bad excuse.”

Lance’s jaw drops. “Perfectly  _ good _ excuse!”

“Lance, you don’t need to hide anything from us,” Shiro reassures as he walks up to his desk. “You’re  _ clearly _ interested in what the Garrison is doing.”

“No, my  _ mom _ is interested in what the Garrison is doing. I have no reason to be!”

“Bad excuse again,” Pidge says.

“You asked if the Garrison was  _ hiding _ something,” Hunk reminds Lance. “If only  _ important  _ people knew about it. You know what that sounds like?”

Lance looks around, then stiffly shakes his head.

“Like someone who’s investigating something,” Hunk answers. “Lance, what are  _ you  _ hiding?”

He’s failed. He’s failed! Lance is terrible at keeping secrets. Or is he just bad at hiding them? He can’t make something up right on the spot—he’s really bad at doing that.

He should just tell them. There are two possible scenarios: they support him, or they don’t. If they support him, then he can have them help him. Pidge is a hacking expert. Hunk’s technological knowledge is off the charts. Shiro’s Garrison position could be used to his advantage. If they don’t support him, then...well, he’s not sure. They won’t  _ stop _ being his friend, he thinks.

Just then, his phone begins to ring. Lance grins at his friends, who are just  _ waiting _ for a reply, and takes out his phone. It’s a video call from his dad. He’s about to answer it when Hunk snatches it from him.

“Hey!” Lance whines, reaching for his phone.

Hunk answers the call and the ruckus of his home blasts through the speakers. Hunk puts the phone at a distance.

“Hunk?” It’s Adrian’s sweet, tiny voice. “Where’s Lance?”

“He took my phone, Adrian!” he yells. He climbs over the desk and latches onto Hunk’s shoulder. “Give it back!”

“Lance will call you back in a few minutes,” Hunk tells his little brother. “Bye Adrian!”

He hangs up. Lance frowns at him and snatches his phone back. “I haven’t talked to him in a while, Hunk.”

“Sorry, but that’s why you’ll call him soon,  _ after _ you answer my question.”

Lance takes a deep breath. There’s no point in hiding it anymore if they’re going to do this to him all the time. If they think he’s in the wrong, then he can convince them otherwise, right? This should be it. “Okay, okay, just don’t get mad, alright?”

“‘Don’t get mad?’ Jeez, what’d you do, Lance?” Pidge asks, seating herself in a student desk. “Kill someone?”

“No! No, I, uh—should I just say this simply?” Lance asks them. “Like, straight to the point?”

“Yes!” They answer in unison.

He breathes.

“I hacked into the Garrison!” He gets up, doing his best not to look at them. “I-I hacked into the Garrison, which  _ many  _ people have done, and I know I shouldn’t sound so nervous, but I didn’t get caught! A lot of kids have, like Ms. Pidge over here, but I didn’t! And I found some things I probably  _ shouldn’t  _ have found. Which is why I was so antsy about Shiro mentioning the experiments! The Garrison has only released information about the nameless shuttle they’re building and I know there’s more than that! I found hundreds of designs and measurements for new aircraft. I came across equations that show trajectories  _ so  _ far away from Earth, and  _ way _ past Kerberos. And I had never heard of them! The Garrison used to be like an open book when it came to new projects! They’re so broke they had to promote them so that they could get funds. Yet here they are, silent! I wanted to know if Shiro knew about them because then  _ maybe _ only important Garrison employees would know, and I  _ guess  _ that would make it more sensible, but he doesn’t! It isn’t sensible at all!”

He nervously turns to his friends. Their faces are unreadable. He was hoping for  _ some _ sort of reaction. A smile, excitement, maybe  _ dread,  _ but nothing. Lance’s heart sinks at the sight. Maybe they don’t believe him. Their faith in him hasn’t always been top notch.

“Why did you do that?” Shiro finally breaks the silence, rubbing circles over his temple.

“I did it over the summer. I got bored.” Not a lie, exactly. He  _ was  _ bored, but he did it in hopes of finding a way to reach Keith. He was successful. But, again, he’s not going to tell them that. That’s just for him.

Hunk and Pidge break into grins. “Are you still hacking?” Pidge asks with a happy tone.

“Of course,” Lance laughs, relieved at the response. “I  _ need _ to know what they’re hiding.”

“I’m in!” she sings. “I’m in, I’m in, I’m here to help. Ah! This is so exciting, you should have told me sooner!”

“Me too,” Hunk smiles. “Let’s tear this place to the  _ ground! _ ”

“No,” Shiro firmly states. They give him a confuzzled look. “No!” he repeats, throwing his hands up in the air. The three of them are taken aback. “I know it sounds like a good idea, but it really isn’t! Hacking into the Garrison is almost like a death wish! What you found, Lance, it’s something you shouldn’t have meddled with in the first place. They have every reason to make designs and equations for nothing because they, too, get bored.”

“Why are you against this?” Pidge asks him.

“I work for the Garrison. We’re in _my_ Garrison classroom.”

“But they’re hiding something,” Hunk reasons. “From you, from me, from us, from  _ everyone. _ The Garrison isn’t just some space school meant for those that are interested. It’s for the world, Shiro! What we do, what we discover, it isn’t for a selected few, it’s for every living thing on Earth. Don’t you want to know why they’re keeping it from us?”

“No!” Shiro admits. “No, the Garrison took us in after all this. They  _ helped _ us—”

“Okay, no,” Lance expresses. His cut catches everyone’s attention. The beginning of that sentence made his blood boil and he wasn’t going to stand it. “Shiro, I respect you, and I care for you. I’m glad the Garrison has offered services to help us get better and all, but what they’ve offered us is really all a show.” He crosses his arms, releasing a shaky breath. “They told our families we were  _ dead,  _ Shiro. They told them there was no hope in finding us, that it was  _ our _ fault we went missing. We came back and they didn’t believe our story. We understand that the whole space robot thing sounds ridiculous, but they couldn’t even take us seriously. They gave us therapists because they thought we were  _ delusional,  _ not to talk about our problems _. _ They belittled us. They gave us a therapist, the promise that we wouldn’t go back into space, and a deluxe room.”

Shiro averts his gaze from Lance. Lance balls his hands into fists.

“They did nothing!” he screams. “And now they’re  _ keeping  _ something from us? They’re not a secret organization. They fed our families  _ lies. _ They don’t care about what we went through. Don’t tell me they listened to you the first time you crash landed on Earth. Don’t tell me they believed your alien story. Sure, they gave you a job and some help, but besides that, they’ve treated you like  _ trash. _ ”

Lance saunters his way over to Shiro. None of them really like to say these things out loud, but Lance took it upon himself to do so. If Shiro hasn’t faced it yet, then Lance has to make sure he does. 

“You  _ know _ I don’t like this,” Shiro whispers, looking at all of them.

“We’re not asking you to,” Lance says. “You don’t have to. But this place wasn’t the happy camp we were told it would be. The Garrison may have treated others well, but us? Definitely not. And  _ I  _ haven’t liked that fact since we got back. So if  _ I  _ can at least bring them down in some way, I’m going to. And I’d really appreciate your help.”

Shiro huffs. He looks between the floor and the board, then glares at his prosthetic arm.

“Please?”

Pidge and Hunk come to Lance’s side. They do their best puppy face to get him to cave in, to help them bring down the Garrison. A chaste smile appears on his face. “Under one condition!” he breaks.

The Garrison trio whoops in excitement.

“ _ None  _ of this hacking business happens in  _ my  _ room.”

“Deal!” Lance agrees.

******

Lance plops down on the couch in his dorm, going to his recent calls on his phone. He taps the ended call from his dad and it starts dialing.

It’s answered quickly, but all Lance sees is the white ceiling of his living room. “Adrian?” Lance asks aloud.

“Wait Lance!” he hears Adrian’s voice some distance from the mic. “I’m getting something!”

“Well, hurry up then  _ Ardilla _ .”

Ten seconds later, the phone lifts and his little brother appears. His skin is a light tan, complementing both of their parents’ skin tones, and his eyes are brown. A bottom tooth to the left of his front teeth is missing, making Lance laugh when he grins. His brown hair has gotten longer—he practically has bangs across his forehead.

Behind him is their dining room and a beige pillar with a framed family photo taken ages ago. Lance had to be fourteen or something when it was taken. He stands next to his mom, who he was already taller than by that time, and she holds her husband's hand. Ramón stands next to his dad, who he, too, towers over. In front of his parents stand the twins Emilia and Camila, and between them, a two year old Adrian struggling to stand. 

“Hey!” the little one yells.

“Hey. How are you?”

“Goooood,” Adrian sings. “I have to show you something really cool!”

“ _ ¿Estas hablando con Lance, Adrian? _ ” he hears his dad ask from a distance.

“Yeah!” Adrian yells back.

The whole house seems to explode with noise at his answer. He figures they’re all rushing towards him now. The first person to pop up on his screen is his dad. He has more gray hairs than he did before. It almost looks weird against his dark brown skin. When he smiles, more wrinkles appear around his light blue eyes than the ones that already fold his skin. He stands behind the couch Adrian sits on.

“Hey Dad,” Lance greets, waving at the camera. He hasn’t seen the rest of his family since he got back to Earth eight months ago. This felt good.

“ _ ¿Como estas, mijo? _ ” he asks. “ _ ¿Como te ha ído? _ ”

“ _ Bien _ . School started three days ago and hasn’t been all that exciting. How’s work?”

“ _ Lo mismo, _ ” his dad groans. “It’s been the same for years,  _ Lancito. _ ”

“LANCE!” one of his sisters scream. He’s guessing it’s Emilia, but it wouldn’t be the first time he mixed the twins voices up.

A flock of light brown curly hair comes up next to his dad. Luckily, he was right. Emilia has light skin and looks the most like their mom. In fact, put her next to Camila, and you wouldn’t even know they were twins. They weren’t born identical, but Emilia is a bonafide copy of Maritza. Camila looks more like Lance than her own twin. Emilia is a little round with brown eyes and  _ very _ thick eyebrows—eyebrows Lance has  _ tried _ growing, but failed.

“Hey!” Lance misses her. He hasn’t talked to her in a while either. God, can’t winter break make its way already? He hates being away from his family.

“Spaceman!” she cheers. She tries to take the phone away from Adrian, but he smacks her hand away. “How’s the Garrison?”

“It’s fine, you know. Space things.”  _ And some hacking, but whatever. _ “When’s your graduation?”

“ _ Diciembre. _ ”

“What day?”

She twiddles her fingers. “...I don’t know.  _ Pero _ don’t worry! Everyone’s got a ticket. I have  _ lots _ to talk to you about when you come back home.”

He knows what that means. Every precursor to their conversations began like that.  _ Girls.  _ That’s fine, though. Emilia describing to him her crushes is always fun. “I’m holding you up to it.”

“I can hear Ramón coming down the stairs,” his dad announces, “so I’m going back to cooking. Bye Lance!”

“Can you guys say hi to Lance later?” Adrian begs from the bottom of the screen, frowning up at his sister. “I need to show him something!”

“Like what?” Emilia asks. “The ca—”

“Shh!”

Lance laughs. Adrian’s still the baby of the family, but his siblings have made sure he doesn’t grow up spoiled.

The phone is plucked from Adrian’s fingers. His whines become loud and clear. Ramón smiles at the camera and waves. His peach fuzz makes him look  _ way _ older than his age, and the more Lance looks, the more he looks like his dad. Dark brown skin, but with black hair. Sky blue eyes, but no wrinkles around. “Hello, little brother.”

“Jesus, did your voice get deeper?” Lance asks. “Puberty should be over, you’re like, thirty.”

“Twenty-nine,” he corrects, rolling his eyes. “Don’t say anything dumb or I take back that couch you’re lying down on.”

“That’s not fair, soon-to-be-dad.”

He groans. Lance grins devilishly. “I’m freaking out over that, stop.”

“Pops Ramón,” he jokes. “So stressed you’re growing a beard, huh?”

“Lance!”

“You were afraid of Adrian, what about your own kid?”

“Oh my God, Lance—”

“I’m kidding,” he teases, pushing his hair back from his forehead. “How’s Nicole?”

“Pregnant,” he deadpans, upset at his previous jokes.

“Wow, I can’t get anything out of you.” Lance rolls his eyes. His brother has always been stubborn. He was surprised when Ramón even started dating. How could someone like someone so stubborn? Nicole is so lively. Ramón is too, but he always adds a pinch of stubborness to anything he does or feels. “Where’s Mom?”

“Grocery shopping with the _ abuelos. _ ”

“Nicole?”

“Work.”

“ _ Pirata _ ?”

“Picking up Irene from school.”

“Her husband?”

“Oh, Vicente’s in the bathroom.”

“ _ ¡Dame el telefono Ramón! _ ” Adrian screeches, high-pitched and deafening. Ramón looks behind him and starts running up the stairs. The little one’s Spanish is a little funny because of his stronger American accent.

“Wait you little  _ ardilla!  _ Let Vicente say hi!”

“ _ ¡Dame lo! _ ”

Lance can tell he’s already on the second floor by the surroundings. The walls upstairs are pearl and the first photos on them are of Cuba. Ramón stumbles back and smiles at someone from beyond the screen. He flips the phone around and shows Lance Vicente against the bathroom door.

“Hey Lance,” Vicente awkwardly greets.

“Hey Vicente,” Lance says. He’s tired of saying hi, but, “Tell Camila I said hi!”

“RAMÓN!” Adrian roars. The phone is quickly snatched by smaller hands. Half of Adrian’s face covers the bottom edge of the screen, and he’s walking back down the stairs. “Sorry Lance,” he apologizes.

“ _ No te preocupes, _ ” Lance assures him. The surroundings change back to the first floor and soon Adrian is back on the couch. “What were you going to show me?”

“Okay, close your eyes!” Adrian leans the phone against a sturdy item on the living room’s coffee table. Lance covers his eyes with his free hand and waits for a signal. “Open!”

Lance looks between his fingers and gasps. In Adrian’s tiny hands is an even  _ tinier _ kitten. Adrian holds it closer to the camera. Its fur is black, orange, and white, with eyes a pearlescent blue. A calico! It looks around and mewls. Lance squeals.

“Where did you get it!” Lance asks, sitting up on the couch. Back in Cuba, Lance took care of two stray cats; the orange one he named Tigre and the black one he named Pantera. He  _ loved _ them, and when he had to leave them in Cuba, he cried for days. Cats were, he found, always special to him. Hell, three different mechanical  _ lions  _ approached him. Now he has a kitten waiting back at home!

“Late birthday present from Mommy.”

“Oh, it’s so cute! What’d you name it?”

Adrian puts the kitten on his lap. It catches the end of Adrian’s sleeve and pulls on it. His brother doesn’t seem to mind. “I need help. I had a really good name, but Mom and Dad and Camila and Emilia and Ramón said no.”

“What was the name?”

“Puss n’ Boots!”

“That’s cute.”

“But it’s too long, so we would call him Pussy!”

“Adrian!” his Dad and siblings scorn from afar.

Lance muffles his laugh. “Oh, no, not...not that, Adrian _. _ ”

“Why not?” Adrian’s innocence is too pure. Lance just wants to give him a tight hug.

“Just no. What other names are there?”

“Well, Camila said Carwash.”

“That’s, uh...” He looks at the kitty, his eyebrows scrunching over. “Why?”

“She wanted something weird,” Vicente yells from somewhere in the room. “She thought Irene would like it.”

Lance shakes his head. “You two don’t know your own daughter, she would never stoop to that low of a level.”

“Emilia said Cinnamon,” Adrian breaks back in.

Too common. “Emilia, c’mon,” he says, hoping she can hear him.

“It’s cute,  _ Lancito, _ ” she yells loud enough to hear.

“What did Mom and Dad say?” Lance asks.

“Mom didn’t know,” he answers. “Dad said  _ Gato _ .”

“Dad said to name the cat….Cat. In Spanish.”

“Yeah.”

“No.”

“Ramón said Peanut Butter.” Adrian raises his arm up, and the kitten flies up with it, claws clutching it tightly. He puts it back down and pets between its tiny ears.

“Too long.”

“Peanut for short!” Ramón calls from far.

“Or Butter!” Vicente calls too.

Adrian cups a hand to the side of his mouth. “I don’t like that one,” he whispers. Lance smiles back. “Help me!”

“Okay, um, just any name?” Adrian is picky, but out of all his four siblings, he’s the one Lance sees himself the most in.

“Weird names!”

Lance gets up to walk around and think. He looks in his dorm for ideas. The astrophysics textbook on his kitchen bar counter written by a Paul Hazzlebee. “Paul?” he suggests.

“Mmm, I like it, but what else?”

Lance is a little hungry. He opens his counter. Blue eyes fall on an old can of tuna that should have been thrown out months ago. He picks it up and walks towards his trash. “Tuna?”

“Because cats like fish! Ow!” The kitty scratches at Adrian’s hand. He turns it over and it crawls into his palm. Emotions flood him just at the scene. “What else?”

Lance dunks it into the bin. “Trash.”

“The kitty isn’t trash!”

“ _ Basura _ .”

“Lance, no!”

“Okay!” He tries thinking of more ideas. On his fridge is a photo of the Garrison trio at the Holt’s home with their dog pissing on a bush in the background. “Dog?”

“Too weird!” Adrian frowns. “I was thinking Octopus?”

“Octopus is cute.” Lance opens his fridge, stomach growling.

“O-C-T-O-P-U-S-S,” his brother spells out. “Puss for short.”

“No!” the house yells in unison. Adrian jumps at the sound.

“Nothing with the letter ‘P,’ Lance!” Emilia yells.

“I get it!” Lance yells back at her. “Tell her to stop yelling at me,  _ Ardilla. _ ”

“Lance says to stop yelling at him.” Adrian looks over the phone and Emilia laughs. He looks back into the screen. “She rolled her eyes.”

Lance takes out the milk from his fridge, cereal from the cabinet, and bowl from above his stove. “Okay, how about Milk?”

“It’s only a little white, Lance,” Adrian reasons, pointing out the white on the kitty’s paws, between its eyes, and between the black and orange fur.

Lance looks at what’s in front of him. Bowl isn’t suitable _. _ “Cereal.”

“I don’t like cereal.”

“Right. Forgot. Sorry.” Lance pours the cereal into his bowl, and then his milk. “I’m running out of ideas.”

Just then, his mail slips under his door. He goes to get it and sees only an advertisement among several envelopes. He picks it up and it details the location of a pop-up shop for the upcoming holiday. While it’s no help to Lance himself, he thinks it’d be a great name for a cat. “Adrian, what do you think about Halloween?”

Adrian looks down at the kitten, and then back at Lance. “Yes!”

“You’re going to name it Halloween?” Ramón asks him.

“Yeah, and you guys can’t say no!” Adrian cheers, holding up the kitty in his two hands. “There’s no ‘P!’”

Adrian picks up the phone and gives him a toothy grin. “Thank you Lance! See you soon!”

“Bye  _ Ardilla. _ ”

The video call ends. God, he misses his family. There is a new addition to it now, and he is going to miss it. Is he going to miss the birth of Ramón’s baby? Adrian’s birthday—he missed that too. Chances are he’s missing Emilia and Camila’s birthday as well. Hopefully he’ll be there for Emilia’s graduation. While space was the ultimate location to get homesickness, the Garrison held second place. Arizona just felt so distant from Texas. He moved out and into the Garrison when he was sixteen, the most home he took with him being Hunk.

Lance misses the whole energy, the vibrancy and yells from across the house. He misses helping in the kitchen and teaching Adrian things he learned at school. Connecting with the little ones, with his siblings, with his grandparents. The ridiculous conversations, the nicknames thrown around—it hurts to be without it. 

Adrian was dubbed “ _ ardilla _ ” because of an incident that happened when he was younger. When Adrian was around three years old, he was playing outside in their backyard while Ramón was  _ supposed _ to keep an eye on him. Instead, he was texting Nicole, who was his girlfriend at the time, instead of watching his infant brother. Through a series of events that no one is completely sure how they occurred, Adrian managed to grab a squirrel by the tail and showed it off to Ramón. Ramón backpedaled that moment, thinking he  _ should _ help get that very alive animal out of his brother’s hands, but decided to take a video instead. Lance remembers the dialogue like his mom’s phone number.

_ Ramón: Adrian, what do you have in your hands? _

_ [Adrian gleefully smiles, raising the squirrel higher] _

_ Ramón: Jesus, Adrian, ¿todavia esta viva la animal? _

_ [Adrian looks at the squirrel, which plays dead in his grasp, but nervously eyes around for a way to escape. Ramón gets closer to Adrian.] _

_ Ramón: Adrian let go of that fu—mmf, that pinche ardilla! _

_ [Ramón’s finger points at the squirrel. Adrian’s eyes widen, then he too points at the squirrel] _

_ Adrian: Pinche ardilla! _

_ Ramón: Oh, God, no! Just ardilla! Not pinche ardilla! Mamá me va a matar if she hears you say that! Ar-di-lla.¡Deja lo! _

_ [Adrian squats down and lowers the squirrel. Once close enough to the ground, he lets it go. The squirrel scrambles off screen. Adrian laughs up at Ramón, who releases a sigh of relief in the background. Adrian points the way the squirrel left.] _

_ Adrian: ¡Pinche ardilla! _

_ Ramón: NO! _

Camila’s nickname is  _ Pirata _ . She had a knack for finding things anywhere she went. When she went out into town, she bargained off everything she found. One day, their mom caught her with a stack of money. Camila got in trouble, obviously, but everytime Mom told the story, extended family would coin her as a pirate. It caught on around the neighborhood, and back in Cuba, she is known as the  _ pirata _ of the town.

Lance is just  _ Lancito.  _ It seems boring, compared to the rest of his siblings, but his  _ too _ has a background. His twin sisters liked to pretend they were royals and Lance often played the prince. They each tweaked their names a bit to fit their status (which, in reality, meant making their names more English), as his sisters learned royalty did back then. They just named him  _ Lancito _ because Camila couldn’t pronounce “Lancelot” correctly, and that annoyed Emilia. Camila and Emilia tended to call him  _ Lancito _ outside of their fantasy game. It, too, caught on quickly.

Lance picks up his bowl of cereal and takes it with him to the couch. He makes himself comfortable with a blanket and turns on his television, the small box on the table projecting the screen. He scrolls through the channels with his finger in the air. Each time he rolls it up, the channel changes, sensing the movement.

A cartoon orange cat pops up on screen next to a group of gruffian looking dogs. They’re out in the city and—Lance chuckles—talking. The movie has cartoon talking animals.

He keeps it on.

******

Astrophysics sucks. Hunk and Lance were hoping for some interactive teaching, considering they’re at a  _ space school,  _ but this teacher likes to lecture and lecture. It isn’t long until Hunk and Lance find themselves playing a game—hangman. It started like how the game  _ should  _ go: guessing a letter to form a word. They played silently because Hunk, who’s learning American Sign Language just for the hell of it, had a sheet of the signs for each letter. All they’d do is point at the letter they’re guessing, and the other would either fill in the blanks or start drawing the man. It got a little boring, so Lance took initiative and started asking random questions through it. Once the question was revealed, the other would answer with the next round and ask a question.

Currently, Lance is trying to figure out the question Hunk has proposed. He figured out the answer to his previous question—what is the weirdest thing about you?—which was “I liked a rock one time.” Now all that was left was: I liked a rock one time. _o _o_ _iss _i_?

Lance isn’t dumb. He knows the remaining letters, he knows the sentence, but he doesn’t want to be the one to tell Hunk. Why is Hunk asking him if he misses Keith? Or “him.”  _ No one _ has talked about him for months! Sure, he’s part of that group too, but his situation is complicated. He talked about him with his mom.  _ That _ counts.

All that has to be drawn is the legs and Lance loses. He looks up at the teacher, just to make sure she isn’t looking their way, and points at “A.”

Hunk lowers his gaze at Lance and draws a stick leg, keeping his eyes on him. Lance scratches his head, trying to make it look believable, and points at “Z.” Hunk shakes his head, eyes widening in surprise at his blatant stupidity, and draws the other leg.

“I’m going to the bathroom,” the teacher announces, “so have a quick break.” She leaves the room and the classroom erupts with noise.

“‘Z?’” Hunk asks, filling in the blanks. Lance bites his bottom lips and covers his face in shame. “There is literally  _ no where _ that letter fits into this question. And ‘A?’ There isn’t any room for  _ vowels. _ ”

“It could have been….” Lance thinks, looking at the now filled in question. “Zia?”

“That’s not a word.”

Lance shrugs, taking out a new sheet of paper for the next game.

“So, do you?” Hunk asks again, crossing his arms and placing them on the desk, leaning forward.

“Do  _ you? _ ” Lance reciprocates, stretching his limbs under the desk.

Hunk smirks at him. “Yeah. He’s my friend. I miss my friend. I mean, sure, he’s a quiet presence and would probably be a silent trouble maker, but it’d be nice to have him around. How about you?”

“Of course I miss him,” he laughs. “Have you ever thought about what it’d be like if he were back?”

“No.” Hunk cranes his neck a little devilishly. Lance wonders why. “Have  _ you? _ ”

Lance gets giddy. “Duh! He’d be exactly as he was before he got kicked out, but a little less pissed and only interactive with us. And people would be like, ‘woah, Keith Kogane? Interacting with people that  _ aren’t _ Shiro?’ And you and me and Pidge would be striding cooly down the hall around him, and it’d be all slow-mo like in those classic comedy movies that take place in public high schools. Oh, Hunk, it’d be so cool! He’ll keep his cold demeanor and bring it down when around us because we’re just  _ that awesome _ and we’ve also all established a great friendship with one another and sincerely care about each other after traumatizing events that have changed us for the rest of our lives—”

“Okay, kids, back to observational astronomy,” the teacher breaks through, everyone shutting their mouths. Lance sits back up and smiles at a dumbfounded Hunk. His best friend slides him the ASL alphabet sheet and begins signing each individual letter with his right hand. He identifies each sign and spells it out in his head.

Hunk mouths, “What the fuck.”

Lance blinks at him, realizing that maybe he’s explained  _ too _ in depth the possible future of Keith Kogane, the Garrison Flight Student, among the Garrison trio. He picks up his pencil and starts writing.

_ Why does nobody talk about him? _

He slides the paper to Hunk and waits for an answer. He writes for what seems like forever, then slides it right back.

_ It sucks that he isn’t here with us. Being reminded of it makes everyone a little sad. But I think he’s doing fine over on that planet. He’s responsible. I miss him though. I wish I could talk to him. _

Lance reads the last sentence again. And again and again.

Lance is a  _ horrible _ person.

He can tell his friends about his hacking, about his problems, about his ideas, but he can’t tell them that he’s been doing the one thing they’ve wanted to do forever. He’s only gotten one letter, but he knows the next one is coming soon. His hypothesis is that it takes two weeks for  _ Diablito _ to get to and from Veldis. It might take a little more time for Keith’s to get back to Lance because he’s  _ probably _ busier than Lance, but he’ll know for sure when that device returns.

Lance is selfish, as he’s admitted before. Keith was  _ his _ rock. He needed Keith. And, maybe if it was someone else he was sending these letters to, he’d be able to tell his friends that he found a way to contact their distant friend. But it wasn’t someone else! It was Keith, being comfortable with Lance, who he’s only ever been free around when it was just  _ them _ two. Both of them kept up that ridiculous rivalry act around their team, but not with each other. If he told his friends about this, that could change. Keith would keep his walls up and Lance wouldn’t be able to break them down.

Lance scribbles something quickly down and passes it to Hunk. He begins to pay attention to the teacher and sees Hunk’s reaction from his peripheral view. He turns his head towards him and frowns.

_ He _ _ has a name. _

******

Hunk had apologized after class, but Lance brushed it off. What hurt could writing Keith’s name be? He wasn’t going to bother. It could have been something personal. Lance wasn’t going to push it. It could have been for Lance’s sake, for all he knows.

But as of now, they walk to Shiro’s room. They see the white curtains closed, which Shiro doesn’t  _ ever  _ do. Just about no one who teaches at the Garrison covers the windows into the hallway because it forces students to at least make themselves seem like they’re paying attention when important faculty passes by. Yet here’s Shiro, closing off his room to the school.

“That’s weird,” Hunk states.

Lance holds the door open for Hunk, who hollers excitingly when he enters. Lance shuts the door behind him and, lo and behold, Matt Holt stands in front of the board, a green marker in his hand, while Shiro sits at his desk. It reads “Surprise!” with drawn confetti around the word. Matt looks like a casual teenager, despite being in his 20s. He sports a beige zip-up hoodie over a black tee with distressed skinny jeans. Among everyone wearing proper Garrison uniform, he stands out like a sore thumb.

“What are you doing here?” Hunk eagerly asks, giving him a welcoming hug. Matt hugs him back with his signature smile.

“I will tell you that when Pidge arrives,” he answers, pulling away and leaning to look at Lance. He stands awkwardly at the door.

It’s weird. The presence in the room, the distance between them, Lance’s different reaction to him than Hunk’s. It’s weird. They’re just acquaintances, and they’re closer now, and it shouldn’t be any more awkward than it was before, but here Lance is, his palms a little sweaty because of his nervousness and his eyes going between looking at the word “Surprise!” on the board and Matt and wondering what he  _ is  _ doing here and— 

“It’s good to see you, Lance!” Matt exclaims, walking up to him with arms opens.

Lance’s eyes widen and maybe he should move, maybe he should open his arms too, maybe he should say it’s good to see him too. Maybe he should  _ do _ something.

Matt hugs him. Lance looks at Hunk and Shiro over his shoulders. They definitely look surprised by the interaction. Lance hesitantly wraps his arms around Matt’s back and says, “It’s good to see you too.”

Matt pulls away first again. “How have you been? It’s been, like, oh God, since we got back to Earth, hasn’t it?”

“I, uh, I’m good!” Lance scratches the back of his head. “You?”

“Oh, I’m excited. I can’t wait for Pidge to walk through that door and see me.”

As if on cue, the door opens behind Lance. He looks over and behind his shoulder to see his short friend with a backpack over her shoulder. That’s kind of suspicious, considering no one at the Garrison uses backpacks and just puts everything in their locker. Her hazel eyes widen at the sight of her brother and a screech releases from her throat. She shoves Lance to the side, runs towards Matt, and tackles him to the ground.

“I knew you’d be here!” she cheers, lightly slamming her fist on his chest. “Your texts aren’t as vague as you  _ think, _ punk!”

“Why did you tackle me?” Matt coughs out.

“I’m excited!”

She rolls off of him and stands, jumping a little because she can’t stand still. Matt stands up, dusting off his clothes. Pidge stands closeby to him.

“Now that Pidge is here,” Matt starts, glancing over at everybody in the room, “I have some exciting news. I have been transferred back here, to the main Garrison.”

Hunk, Pidge, and Shiro start cheering relentlessly. Lance claps and smiles, adding little “woos” as background noise. Hunk punches Matt’s back in a friendly way and Shiro puts an arm on his shoulder. Pidge jumps in a circle, and once everyone has congratulated Matt in their own way, she gives him a loving hug.

“Celebrate!” she yells, sitting on her knees and unzipping her backpack. “Since Matt is so  _ obvious,  _ I knew he’d  _ also _ have something good to tell us, so I got something to celebrate!”

Pidge pulls a champagne bottle out of her bag, and out of her sheer force, she pops the top off and it explodes. Everybody steps back surprised. Where did she get a champagne bottle? And where did she learn to take off a champagne bottle cap?

“Pidge, where did you get that?” Hunk asks.

“How did you get into the teacher’s faculty room?” Shiro asks right after.

Lance makes a mental note.

******

Hacking the Garrison again—the last thing on Lance’s agenda for the day. He decided to go a little easy on digging deep for secret information and went to look at the details for the new shuttle the Garrison is working on. He’s been browsing it for half an hour already. According to the quick calculations he made in his head, it’s not going to travel as far as initially thought. It’ll barely pass what they’ve already explored.

Lance sighs. If only the Garrison knew how truly far their experiments would go. He would prove it to them if he was ready to get expelled from the school. The advancements they’d achieve if they just  _ tried _ it.

A knock on his door interrupts his thoughts. Hastily, he gets rid of everything he hacked into on his screen and turns his computer off. Who could be asking for him at this hour?

The one at his door is Matt in a loose olive tank and baggy pajama pants. His hair is disheveled, but he doesn’t seem tired. In fact, he seems a little angry.

Awkwardness: back. It’s back. What does Matt want? Why is an angry Matt at Lance’s door? He barely knows him why is he— 

“Why are you hacking the Garrison?” he demands.

Lane scrunches his eyes, processing those words and leaning back. “Huh?” he whispers.

“Hacking. The Garrison. I know you’re doing it.” Without asking, Matt walks past Lance and enters his dorm.

Panic settles in. Why does he know that? No, why does he  _ think _ that. He has to cover this up, deny as much as possible. But  _ how, why, since when  _ does he know that? 

“I-I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Lance straightens up and closes the door. Matt stalks over to his computer. Lance races towards him, grabbing his shoulder to face him. “Hey! I never said you can touch my computer. I never even let you in.”

“Oh, don’t try to hide it from me,” Matt rolls his eyes and strikes a finger at him. Then he flashes a toothy grin. Now Lance is nervous. “Want to know how I know?”

“Y-You don’t know what you’re talking about, Matt.” Lance was  _ about _ to answer the question with “yes” but caught himself first. He wants to know because perhaps someone else knows about it, and he can’t have that kind of information running around.

Matt rolls his eyes and crosses his arms. “Look, no one  _ told  _ me you were doing it. I figured it out when I was at the northern Garrison. I have this system installed in my software that allows me to trace suspicious activity.  _ Your _ hacking was one it picked up.”

“Nope, my hacking couldn’t of—” Lance freezes. He can’t keep secrets, even from people he doesn’t know well. Who in his family can he blame this on?

Matt smirks at him. “Busted.”

“No, no, no,” Lance laughs it off, lightly pushing him away from his computer. Then he deadpans. “You’re wrong, I didn’t mean  _ my hacking _ .” He says “my hacking” with air quotations.

“You did this to yourself.”

He won’t let this spill out so easily. “Matt, look—”

“Just admit it.”

“No, because you’re wrong!”

“Lance, I’m very right.”

Lance groans. He really has to get better at lying. “How do you know your software is right, huh? How can it be—”

“Stop trying.”

“Fine!” Lance caves much too quickly. Matt Holt just  _ had _ to have some software in his computer to track him down, then manage to get transferred to where Lance is studying, and call him out. That had to be his motive. He moves to the bar stools to settle down. “Explain, then.”

“I erased the traces you left behind, in case you’re wondering, but not before I followed them. I found what you came across.”

“Nothing new to you,” Lance belittles, “because you’re all high-and-mighty on the Garrison hierarchy. You knew about those wingspans and shit.”

“No.” Matt shakes his head. “No, Lance, I didn’t know about  _ any _ of what you found until I followed your traces. I don’t know who  _ does _ know about it! It’s absurd.”

Lance raises an eyebrow. Matt? Knowing nothing about what he found? The Garrison hiding stuff from  _ Matthew Holt? _ “So what?” Lance asks defensively. “Yeah, it’s absurd. So what?”

Matt softly laughs. “So you’re doing something about it, and I want to help.”

Lance’s eyes widen. “I’m not doing  _ anything— _ ” 

“What, you thought I didn’t think you’d be doing something to fix it? Even if we weren’t close in space, you always cared about others before yourself, and you  _ always  _ tried to find a way to fix issues. That’s not just a team Voltron thing. That’s a  _ you  _ thing. Plus, I think I’d be valuable to your investigation.”

“How so?” Lance interrogates.

“I have access to systems you couldn’t dream of”.”

He didn’t think much about a decision. That settled it pretty quickly. He takes out his phone and starts dialing.

“What are you doing?” Matt asks, trying to look at his screen.

“I got Pidge, Hunk, and Shiro in on it too,” Lance grins. “We’re going to organize this heist.”

Matt laughs. “It’s not a heist. Do you know what a heist is?”

“It sounds cooler.”

******

Free time, Lance discovered, was only available to him on weekends. Despite the detailed steps Pidge, Hunk, Shiro, Matt, and him created for their newly launched investigation titled, to everyone but Matt and Shiro’s agreements, “The Heist,” Lance found that now he should only do his hacking with his friends. There was nothing to do in his dorm, but there was something to do outside of it.

Outside is hot. Even if Lance is wearing some old basketball jersey from back home and shorts, the sun is ruthless. More so in some secluded mountain desert. He leans against the rocks, next to that small cave meant for  _ Diablito. _

Lance’s free time consists of waiting for Keith’s letter to get back. He’s been waiting since the morning, taking a bag of chips he bought as a snack, a messenger bag full of work he should do, and instead busying himself with games on his phone. The sweat that built up between his sunglasses and nose runs down the sides, but just as it begins to bother him, he sees that red device fly towards him. He  _ knew  _ it. He knew it’d come back, he knew Keith would write back. Watching it make its way towards its landing place gets Lance pumped. It’s been two and a half weeks since he sent  _ Diablito  _ its way, meaning his hypothesis is proven correct.

He cups the device in his hands and puts it in his messenger bag. He leisurely makes his way back to his dorm with no interruptions. Lance drops down on his bed, opens up  _ Diablito, _ and gets to reading.

_ To: Lance _

_ Congrats. Your invention didn’t fail. It got back to me a second time. Really, Lance, still doubting your capabilities? The Garrison’s mailing system is shit and here you are ousting them not only in that but their aerospace travel. I can’t even send a letter properly because I’m short on stamps all the time. _

_ I don’t think there’s any way for this to get into Kolivan’s hands. Kolivan is a busy guy and has  _ _ lots _ _ of things to do before he worries himself with the Blade’s mail. I’m pretty sure this thing comes by every month too. But, again, communication is forbidden, and he’d definitely have something to say if he found out about this. I’m risking it all for you, buddy. _

_ The treatment of the Galra was ridiculous, as you said. Now it’s just...compliant. They don’t like us. I walked through their precincts and got sneers. People shut their door when they saw my uniform. They have every reason to not like the Blade of Marmora so I can’t fight them. They’re also taller than you and me so it’s pretty hopeless. But I hope it gets better as the Veldis Task progresses. _

_ My job has gotten less boring since the last time I wrote, but not by much. At the moment, it is reeaally aggravating. I kind of don’t exist here. I’m ignored when they want my input and am definitely undermined. But, I will insist, it’s better than working at the cafeteria at the Garrison. Hell, I’m working with aliens, and I’d take that over seeing Iverson’s wrinkled face any day. _

_ I’m just going to trust you on “Diablito.” I don’t know how to sign “traveler” because the textbooks weren’t  _ _ that _ _ advanced and I only remember the alphabet, so we’ll have to see about that. AND I know Korean and speak it fluently. Just because you’ve never heard me speak it doesn’t mean I can’t. Not like any of  _ _ you _ _ know Korean.  _

_ Also I didn’t even come up with Viator, my friend did. I have a friend! One that can give two less shits about me looking way more human than Galra. She’s offered to teach me everything she can about the Galra customs and people when I have the time. She’s actually the one who brings in Diablito to me because she works in the messaging office and all. She’s the only other person who knows about it here. She’s a nice person. So far, she’s told me two Galra facts: red marks are a recessive trait and music is an important factor to their culture, but was lost with Daibazaal so they preserve it with music boxes. Pretty cool. _

_ School should be starting soon, right? Or maybe it already started. I’m only relatively aware of what day it is on Earth. Or month. Maybe week? It should be August, right? I’m losing my mind here. Anyways, what are your classes? I kind of want to know. Maybe I can help you with some of it. You know I’m smart because you created some dumb rivalry about it. _

_ I am 200% here to support you and your hacking, but you better not be a dumbass about it. You have to keep an eye out on what you leave behind and all. It’s how everybody who tried hacking got caught by the big guys. It’s unsafe, Lance, and I don’t want you to risk it all just to prove something. It’s not worth it if you don’t know what you’re doing, so good thing you’re “practicing” hacking :) also nice dorm damn. Better than what I’m living in. All I got is a bed and a closet. And a window. _

_ There isn’t anything I’m not comfortable with reading, in regards to the war. They were pretty open about  _ _ everything _ _ when the Veldis Task started. The Blades were talking about. I had to sit through some interviews with people who worked directly with Zarkon. It’s all they’d talk about. Couldn’t exactly avoid it. You can trust me with whatever you need to say. I won’t judge, promise. You know that right? I trust you’ll do the same. _

_ The stars  _ _ are _ _ nice. No one’s ever called me “star boy” because of it but you give me new nicknames, like, every minute. Everything that’s natural on Veldis is nice, not these stupid headquarters and precincts built here. But you’re right, there’s no moon. I’m not exactly sure how space works out here and why they  _ _ don’t _ _ have a moon but it’s just the stars and funky sky. _

_ So my description of the stars is pretty? Well, your description of the moon is very...correct. Very correct. Individualistic. Distinctive. Unique. I don’t know what to tell you because I know what the moon does and you know I do too. “The sun of the night.” Nice. I do miss the moon. I miss Earth. I miss home. _

_ I’m gonna run on about something again, but you had me thinking about it after your letter. That polaroid you sent made me feel really...peaceful? The mountains, the stars, the moon, the Fraunhofer line...I miss that. I miss seeing that every night. Looking into it, discovering it, the view of it. These stars are nice and this sky is beautiful, but it isn’t home. It’s some place I’m stuck at, some place I don’t want to be at anymore. I just had to find something nice to cope with. I’m tired of Veldis. I want to go home. _

_ That shack I lived in for some time has so much of what I enjoyed. Maps and dumb equations of things I’ve forgotten by now. A really bad bed that I forced myself to believe was comfortable. A wonky TV that would go out every hour or two. You know how I mentioned music boxes and how they’re important to Galra people? I have one too. I’ve had it since I was little, like my knife. While my knife connects me to the Blade of Marmora, my music box connects me to the Galra. I haven’t played it in a while, but now I want to. I know what it is, and that’s different because I always avoided playing it as I got older. I don’t know, it has more importance to me now. _

_ The speeder! I miss my speeder. They’ve got something like my speeder here on Veldis, but it’s way harder to control. It too hovers but the handles are weird and maneuvering feels all wrong. Don’t like to use it but sometimes work calls for it. _

_ I hate admitting it but I miss the Garrison. I haven’t been in that institution for who knows how long, but I want to get back in. Which also feels wrong! I’ve been in space for over two years now, I  _ _ want _ _ to avoid it as much as possible, but the Garrison was “fun” in its own way. Do you know how I got expelled? I feel like that deserves a separate letter to tell. I’m pretty sure some rumors went flying around and I want to know them before I explain. _

_ I miss the team. I know we weren’t close at all before Voltron, but if I were back on Earth with yall, it would be better than before. Before, I was a delinquent who didn’t care about anyone or anything around me. I was pretty much only friends with Shiro, and I had every class with Matt for, like, a year straight. I was your rival, I guess. But that would all be different, like you said! I’d have a group of friends to be with. Maybe I’d be less scary. I’d be able to get closer with all of you, individually. Maybe that’s why the Garrison seems appealing to me. It means I’d be with you. _

_ Personally, I think we’re pretty close, but we don’t know basic things about each other. We came to each other with our problems but I don’t know your favorite kind of food, and I’m taking a wild guess and saying you favorite color is blue. But it could be green, ‘cause of your jacket! I want to get to know you better. Tell me basic things. I’ll tell you a few about me that you might not know. _

  * _My favorite color is red_


  * I like junk food. Specifically fries.


  * Lactose-intolerant.


  * Whenever I’m mad I drink regular milk


  * Only child


  * Kogane is my legal last name


  * I was in foster care from 5 to 18


  * Never was adopted


  * I once owned a Doberman named Jinx. Had to leave it with my foster family. That was the longest I’ve ever been with a family. They were the Chang’s. Three years.


  * I took care of a stray cat family and stole money from my foster parents to buy them food. Was with that family for a year. I shouldn’t have stole money from them. They were nice.


  * My music taste on Earth was very jumbled and I don’t think you’d like it at all


  * Got interested in flight school because of this movie I watched when I was younger about planes


  * My first boyfriend was in high school and he was pretty awful


  * I never came out to any of my foster parents


  * I wish I was taller


  * I have a stuffed hippo plush named ViVi


  * My speeder is 100% stolen


  * That shack I lived in? I built it. Stole wood from the Garrison.


  * Black belt in taekwondo so that’s why i kicked your ass every time in the training room


  * If you look close enough, my hair has purple tints. Probably genes from my mom. As far as I’ve noticed, Galra either have white, gray, or some shade of purple as their hair color.



_ Hope you’re doing well Lance. I’ll hear back from you soon. _

_ Please let me know when Oct 23 is, _

_ Keith _

******

Lance stuffs some paper, a pen,  _ Diablito, _ and his polaroid camera in his messenger bag and heads to somewhere he hasn’t been in a while.

Keith misses Earth. That’s understandable. He could have been here for nearly eight months already, but that was not the path taken. Jesus, Keith hasn’t been on Earth for  _ two years.  _ Two years! Of course he misses the team, his shack, his speeder, the  _ moon. _ Lance missed them when he was in space too. Everyone stuck in another galaxy would. It wasn’t  _ fair _ .

As he walks to his destination, he makes a mental note of Keith’s statement. _ ”There isn’t anything I’m not comfortable with hearing, in regards to the war….You can trust me with whatever you need to say. I won’t judge, promise.” _ Keith has always been like this. Nothing like that fazed him unless  _ he _ was doing the talking. Lance caught Keith avoiding what he should and shouldn’t say, not because he was scared of the reaction, but because he was scared of it himself. Admitting has always been difficult for him, but Lance was happy to ease him in that direction. Admitting, Lance thinks, is just a harsher term for accepting. Keith would be a lot more confident if he saw himself  _ accepting _ things rather than  _ admitting _ them.

Star boy was right about one thing; They know about each other’s deepest feelings but don’t know the simplest things about one another. Twenty simple facts could change that.

His favorite color is red, as Lance guessed. That dumb red jacket has to be chosen for  _ only _ the color. It fits Keith’s whole aesthetic, as it does Hunk’s, but Lance would  _ never _ wear something like that.

Keith likes junk food, specifically fries. Fries are probably universally liked, so it comes as no surprise. Lance likes fries too. Maybe Keith likes chilli cheese fries. Lance makes some mad chilli cheese fries. 

He’s lactose-intolerant, followed by drinking regular milk when mad. That would explain the many times he caught Keith walking through the dorm, chugging a gallon of milk like it was alcohol and coming to class the next day like he was hungover. 

And he’s an only child. If he had a sibling, it would probably have been brought up during their time in space. Lance is easily able to tell who has siblings and who doesn’t—people who don’t have someone with their same DNA are slightly more sane. With Keith, he could never tell, and the next fact explained why. 

Lance  _ didn’t _ know Keith was a foster kid. He should have guessed it. Sometimes Keith would say things like “I don’t have a family to go back to” or “Shiro is my only family” and Lance wouldn’t try to figure anything more out. He knew what it was like to have a sibling, but his experience is undoubtedly different from Lance. Family was a sensitive topic to him back then. The more he talked about it, the more it worried him. Once he found out he was a Galra, he just wanted to find out about his Galra side, his Galra mom, anything and everything Galra about him. He never even mentioned his dad. How could no one have adopted him? Why was the longest amount of time he spent with a family three years? How could he have gotten into the foster system? Was Lance even allowed to ask these questions? He had the walk to decide.

Keith and a Doberman is the perfect duo. Like Lance and cats. And Keith took care of stray cats! Like Lance! He can’t wait to tell them how similar they are.

What could possibly be in that jumbled music taste that Lance wouldn’t like? Lance has found himself jamming to all types of music. There was bound to be something he’d appreciate.

The way they got interested in flight school is very different. Lance’s mom got him into this lovely mess. Keith got into it through a movie. The last time Lance got interested in something through a movie, he learned how to milk a cow.

While he always thought it, he never  _ knew _ Keith was gay. Keith’s sexuality was the  _ least _ of their problems and he wasn’t going to pry. Sometimes he’d catch him looking at the attractive men around the planet, and while Lance agreed, he’s never really had any good experiences with the attractive guys. Rolo? Betrayed them. Lotor? No thanks. 

Well, the girls Lance met weren’t any better. Lance didn’t like being kidnapped or cuffed.

It’s only fair for Lance to come out to him  _ too. _ “I’m bi and if you didn’t know that, how.” He doesn’t mind telling people he’s bisexual because he thinks it’s quite obvious, but Keith wouldn’t have noticed. He really doesn’t know how to read people. All the alien guys were douches, so Lance never flirted with them. He  _ did _ scan them and graded them in his head based on personal preferences, but they were dropped rather quickly. Alien girls? The ladies were nicer to him. Plaxum, though she kidnapped him, was actually a great mermaid who only wanted the best for her people. Nyma, though she cuffed him to a tree, ended up joining the Rebels.

Lance has never had a boyfriend. He’s had, like, two girlfriends, but not a boyfriend. Several crushes on boys, _yes_ , but in the end, they were as straight as can be. Now he wants to know why Keith’s boyfriend was so awful. He kind of wants to know everything about this boyfriend. How old? Age difference? Grade level? Sports? Or a musician? Keith seems like someone who’d be interested in musicians. Lance is a musician—not that Keith is romantically interested in him. It’s just a coincidence. And _first?_ How many boyfriends has Mullet had? Did he have one at the Garrison? In space? _On Veldis?_

Lance likes being taller than Keith. It gives him an advantage to nothing in particular, but he likes it anyways.

When reading, Lance had snorted at the fact that Keith, this reserved emo guy, had a stuffed hippo toy with a name. Not because it was embarrassing—hell, now Lance is going to tell him about his giant shark body pillow named Fang—but because it wasn’t something he’d expect Keith to have.

Keith the Thief. New coined nickname! Lance could probably steal a speeder too, if he knew how to drive one. Lance barely passed his driver’s test after one too many tries and many disappointing looks from his father, the auto mechanic. He’s going to need a story on the robbing of the speeder and wood.

The shack was nothing too impressive until fact 18. Keith is talented,  _ super _ talented, and Lance can only wish he could be like that. Lance can’t even fix his car and his dad is a mechanic.

_ Screw  _ Keith’s black belt. Lance had way too many bruises from his time in space and he was  _ never _ sure if it was from battle or Keith. Lance won a couple of times, but not before getting a heavy beating from some guy who  _ apparently had a black belt in taekwondo. _

The only purple Lance has ever seen on Keith is what’s in his eyes. He’s never seen purple eyes before until he met Keith. They’re beautiful—Lance has admitted that. Even when Keith is raging, they’re beautiful. But now, Lance has a new goal: the next time he sees Keith, he’s going to examine that hair like it has lice.

Lance reaches Keith’s shack soon enough. The old wooden thing is still standing up, despite no one taking care of it. Around the place, little plants have started growing, which isn’t usual. 

Lance recognizes a small bush growing of a purple flower, commonly known as the Texas Ranger or Texas Sage. Only a couple have sprouted, but he’s seen enough of them to know the outcome. Soon, it’ll look like a shrub of gorgeous lavender. Keith talked about Earth—maybe Lance should send him a photo of something that’ll remind him of it. What could be more Earthy and natural than a flower growing in front of his shack?

Another nickname for Keith: Texas Ranger (because he’s  _ very _ Texan and  _ very _ purple).

He sits down on the dusty mountain desert ground, takes out his polaroid camera, and finds the angle to capture the photo. He makes sure the shack is in the background for the added effect of home.

Once printed, he saves it in his bag and gets to writing.

******


	5. the markku

Keith looks at himself in the mirror as he pushes the white cape’s button through the loop around his neck. He pulls his suit’s hood over his head and stares at his reflection.

White isn’t a good color on Keith  _ or _ the Blade of Marmora suit. White had no place among the grays and blacks and glowy purples. It hugged his neck awkwardly. The cape felt much too long and flowy for the outfit of a rebel soldier. The whole outfit is a clash of contrasts, but this outfit is common around headquarters now.

And it shouldn’t be. It shouldn’t because this is the fourth death since Thorynx, and it’s barely been a month. They shouldn’t be wearing this traditional white cape because  _ no one should be dying. _

The day after Thorynx’s death, Sigrun’s Galra fact turned into a Galra lesson. It was about how mourning goes in their culture. Mourners wore white capes out of respect. Close family and friends of the deceased wore a white cape with the lyrics of a mourning song trimmed in navy blue on the borders. Mourning took three days, starting the day after death.

The first day, people would come together and sing mourning songs for hours, then proceed to have a meal. The second day, viewing ensued. The last sight of the deceased. The final day was the procession. Instead of burying, they send the corpse wrapped in flowers down a body of water as it catches fire. It’s quite beautiful, Keith will admit. The first time he experienced it, he was in awe. Galras have a reputation for being ferocious and rude, but this proved all of that wrong. It was peaceful. It was the first sense of  _ peace _ Keith has gotten since, maybe, the Garrison.

This wasn’t peaceful anymore. This was chaos and sorrow and  _ anger.  _ Who was killing these people? He hasn’t had time to figure out, not with these funeral traditions happening. He had to be distracted for three dayss at a time and he couldn’t focus on his assignment.

Keith leaves his room and makes his way to the funerary room where they do the singing. He himself doesn’t do any—he doesn’t know the language—but he does enjoy listening. Attending isn’t only something he’s supposed to do, it’s something he  _ wants _ to do. He wants to pay his respects. It’s also him feeling  _ part _ of something he always belonged in. He’s on Veldis to get closer to his culture. This does that.

The room is purely beige from the ceiling to the floor. It’s packed when he enters, a flurry of white capes standing before him. High on the end wall hangs the photo of the deceased, with her name written beautifully in Galran. She was bald and her white furry ears stuck out from the side. Her yellow eyes were wide ovals and she had a flat nose. She barely smiled in the photo.

“If you could read Galran,” a voice that could only be Sigrun’s says, “then you’d know her name was Cathallia Eeglis.”

Sigrun had slid up next to Keith without knowing. The same cape ties around her neck and below it is her normal black on gray uniform. She wraps an arm around his shoulders and smiles.

“You looked a little lonely,” she whispers, “and confused.”

Keith shrugs but smiles back at her too. He’s happy that Sigrun and him have grown closer as friends and that he isn’t completely alone on Veldis anymore. He has someone to talk to, and even if she barely tells him personal things, Keith has found himself rambling to her one too many times. He’s gone to her place after every funerary event, not only because he didn’t want to be in such a morose location like the headquarters, but because he needed a lot more explaining about these traditions.

“Not  _ that _ confused,” he whispers back to her. He looks up at her and catches her sorrowfully looking at the portrait of Cathallia. Her eyebrows crease and she chews her bottom lip. “Did you know her?”

Sigrun removes her arm from his shoulders and sighs. A bell rings, signaling the beginning of the event, and the people start to move. In the clearing, he sees the barrier that separates the crowd from close family. Like before, Keith follows Sigrun to their location. This time, though, instead of staying in the middle, like usual, she makes her way to the front. He can barely keep up with her as everyone crowds in; all he can see is the white bun that sits on top of her head.

“Sigrun,” Keith whispers loudly, hoping to grab her attention. He walks on his tiptoes to get a better view. “ _ Sigrun! _ ”

She doesn’t respond, just keeps on walking. Keith grows anxious with the distance increasing between them. Right when he reaches the barrier, he realizes he’s lost her. He looks around him to find the white bun, but fails to do so. Keith switches his view to the space in front of him for the close family and friends, then sees what he was looking for.

Around ten people stand in the designated area for important attendees, and one of them has the white head of hair that could only be his friend’s. Sigrun turns to look for Keith too, and that’s when he notices the difference in her cape. The navy blue engraving at the edges, meaning she’s either close family or friend. Keith’s shoulders hunch at the realization and it changes the atmosphere for him.

Sigrun knew just about everybody, by Keith’s standards. Thorynx’s death didn’t hit Sigrun hard, but she said they were acquaintances. They had their differences, but it was sad to see him go. The following death was of Acastas Bwana, who was part of the team that rescued her from imprisonment. The third death was Jotun Rezzond, someone who she worked with back on Zarkon’s ship. They were all people she knew of _. _ Never were they people she had to pull out the important cape for.

Her eyes latch on to Keith and the saddest smile comes to her lips. It’s one Keith has had to present time after time as well, and he knows better than anyone that it hurts to show. It hurts to hide your pain.

******

Sigrun and Keith walked to her home in silence. Those who lived near her wanted to pass their condolences, but Keith’s presence put them off. Keith wanted to pass his condolences too, but it all seemed wrong. He was going to wait till they were alone.

Sigrun shut the door behind her as Keith unmasked. He goes to sit at the dining table and waits for her to finish putting away the materials she got today. He’s been aimlessly following her around all day, mainly to avoid his responsibilities, and she’s been awfully quiet since the ceremony. He wants to talk to her.

He’s not sure what to say.

Keith has dealt with death a lot these two years. A lot of the deaths affected him in some way because their life was most likely sacrificed for a cause he was part of. Ulaz, Thace, Antok, Regris—four of the  _ thousands _ of lives that ended it all for the slim chance of Voltron’s success. While their passings were sad, it was mostly a deep, dark void of “what ifs.” What if it wasn’t worth it? What if they lived? What if Voltron failed? It was about making sure they didn't die in vain. To top it off, Keith couldn’t call those people his friends. Acquaintances, colleagues, workmates,  _ yes, _ but nothing past that.

Those deaths buried a fear in Keith that shake him to the core. What if his  _ friends _ died? What if Shiro was gone for good? If Pidge never came back from looking for her family? If Hunk’s lion’s defenses weren’t as strong as he thought? And Lance….

Keith would be lying if he claimed he hadn’t thought of it before. While all of his friends’ death would be heartbreaking, Lance’s would haunt him till the day he died. He’s had so many feelings for him, has pictured some stupidly cute future with him, and for the slim possibility of it to disappear? It scares him. To never tell Lance how he feels, after so many years...it scares him.

Keith had dealt with loss back on Earth. His mother was the first loss he was aware of, even at such a young age. The second loss was his father. The losses after that were leaving his several foster families, the dogs and cats and iguanas he owned, and the friends he made at different schools. No one’s ever  _ died _ —he just lost them over time. It wasn’t until space came to fuck him up that he experienced death.

He rubs his thumb against his fist for comfort. “How’d you know her?” Keith asks first.

Sigrun stops putting away her materials in the cabinets over her sink. She turns to face him, body leaning back on her hands propped atop the counter. Her white hair is unkempt and falls around her face, she hunches forward, and though her yellow eyes have no pupils, he knows she’s looking away. It’s only then when Keith sees her eye bags and just how worn out she is. She looks way older than her age—at least fifteen added years. This isn’t his friend.

“We go back to the prisons,” Sigrun admits, a shake to her voice. “We were cell mates with about six other women. As time went on, that number diminished due to the arena fights. We were the last two in that cell until our liberation.” She tucks some hair behind one of her furry ears. “She lived down the street with her husband and son. I took care of him when I was free. She has a business down in the marketplace selling music boxes.”

Keith perked up at the mention of music boxes. “Did she give you the one you have?” he asks, remembering the story she told him of how she got it.

“No, actually.” She laughs softly as a memory comes back to her. “Her husband  _ makes _ the music boxes. She handles the business. When my friend at the prison died, he had made one for me. Cathallia and him had a romance all those years we were there.” She walks up to the table Keith sits at and joins him. Looking directly at him, she continues. “Apparently, it was made for us to share, because he didn’t manage to steal enough material for two, but Cathallia told him to give it only to me because I was in more pain than she was.” She smiles at him. “She was the one  _ I  _ talked to about my crush on that friend. Cathallia always looked after me once she passed.”

Keith swallows the lump in his throat. “You had a crush on your friend?” he asks nervously.  _ She?  _ God, how similar could these two be?

Sigrun smiles at the memory. “I guess you could say a lot of people did. She really was a wonderful person. But I had an undying lust for her for a long, long time.”

“Did she ever notice?”

She shakes her head and looks him in the eyes. “Someone else was always on her mind.”

Keith nods slowly and starts relating it to his own life. Lance is oblivious. He either noticed Keith’s terrible flirting and ignored it, or just never got the memo. Or he did notice and just didn’t want to build on it (which is understandable, because of their whole saving-the-universe thing was a priority). Or he didn’t want to build on it because he didn’t like him back? Fuck, what if someone back on Earth was on his mind?

“Don’t compare our situations,” Sigrun breaks in, taking notice of Keith’s pondering. “I knew I never had a chance with her. She was always out of it, never really wanted to stay with us. That someone occupied her mind and it was for a reason I don’t think anybody could fight with. Lance isn’t like that. If anything, you’re probably the one on his mind.”

Keith slightly blushes. “What makes you think that?” he asks.

“He writes you letters, Keith,” Sigrun deadpans. “He made some little airplane thing to communicate with you! I’ve lived long enough to know that that means he cares in some way.”

Keith presses his lips together and smiles. His blush gets redder and he’s mentally kicking himself, asking why such words would make him flush like this. Sigrun does have a good point, though, and it’s that Lance wouldn’t be doing this for nothing. He thinks of that first letter again, filled with all his dumb and cringingly sweet reasons for sending him a mechanical paper airplane.

“How’s your mission going?” she asks, crossing her arms and leaning back on the chair. “Haven’t heard anything about it since you told me.”

Keith rolls his eyes. “No time to work on it. Kolivan knew everybody who’s passed, so he’s been too focused on that, but I can work on it. It’s just hard to get by him.” He swipes his hair back and sighs. “I’m going to talk to him soon.”

Sigrun smiles. “Well, you let me know so I can help.”

******

Keith’s been roaming the headquarters for about ten minutes now. He’s keeping his eyes open for Kolivan, who he’s had enough of waiting on. He has to talk to him before anymore deaths happens out of the blue. Anything slightly mysterious can have a connection to this rebel group and they have to take action.

Kolivan comes walking through the hall with his mask down and braid still around his neck. He takes quick steps and seems disconnected. Keith starts making his way towards him, which catches Kolivan’s attention.

“Kolivan,” Keith begins. Kolivan stops walking and looks down at him, quirking his eyebrow up.

“What do you want?” he scorns at Keith, his eyes narrowing.

Keith shrinks within himself. “We need to work on the mission.”

Kolivan sighs. “Keith, can we do this tomorrow morning?” he asks.

“We’ve been putting it off for a month. What if—”

“Do you think that’s what’s on my mind, Keith? I’m worried about some stupid mission that’s gonna fail?” Kolivan hovers tauntingly over him, his face getting angrier the more he talks. “My friend is  _ dead _ and you think I’m worried about some cameras?”

Keith doesn’t recall him being at either of the funerary events for Cathallia. He would go if she was his friend. He’s done so for every other person.

He whispers, “What if the group is related to the the deaths?”

Kolivan blinks and strokes his chin. “I can’t work on it.”

“I can!” Keith reasons. He needs to work on it alone, actually. Maybe he’ll manage to do what he wants this time around without Kolivan deciding otherwise. “You can trust me. I  _ was _ put on to lead the mission by you, right?”

Kolivan begins to walk. Keith follows closely behind, hoping to get an answer out of him.

“You have to promise me something,” Kolivan says, walking faster to further their distance. Keith doesn’t respond, but he continues. “You  _ only _ use the cameras.”

Keith curses in his head. “I promise.”

Kolivan tells him where to find the resources he needs and how to set them up. Keith will have to go to the warehouse to find the cameras to hook up and, luckily, it isn’t too far away from headquarters. On the way there, he devises his plan.

Tomorrow is the final funeral day. Cathallia wasn’t only known by the Blade of Marmora, but also by all the Galra on Veldis. She sold music boxes, a Galra antique! Everyone knew her someway and wanted to pay their respects. The first two funerary events were packed, which means the final day is going to be overflowing. The event will take place at night, but everyone will start heading over once the sky turns gray. Keith will take that time to install his equipment.

The warehouse is two stories high with neon purple lights running laterally down the building. Not a single window is in sight. The entrance is a slide-up, metal door, and that proves to be difficult for Keith. He’s supposed to be sneaky about this. Not just  _ anybody _ can get into the warehouse, and much less the shortest member of the Blade of Marmora. Kolivan mentioned a back door to him that could only be opened with the material of the Marmora suit. He stalks over towards the back and finds a normal door. He puts his hand on the handle and hears it unlock.

Keith enters and is quite disappointed. Though the ceiling soars way above his head, most of the warehouse is empty. It’s dull, metal, and smells like rust. Opened and sealed boxes line the edges of the room, which means Keith won’t have to dig for too long. He finds a light switch next to the back door and flicks it on. Yellow light fills the room. Dust particles fly throughout the space and Keith coughs as he breathes them in. He looks over the boxes and his head droops.

They’re labeled in Galran. He still hasn’t learned the language, mostly because he doesn’t want to, but this is just messed up! Now he  _ has _ to dig through them all. Kolivan did this on purpose, didn’t he? As, like, revenge for not ever learning how to read Galran. Keith laughs at himself.

He begins scourging through the boxes, looking for the tiny cameras. He digs through a box of wires, a box of Blade of Marmora suits, a box of unused droids, and a box of microphones before he finds the cameras. Keith gives the box of microphones a signature dent on the side just in case he ever has to come back to them.

******

Installing the cameras proved to be harder to Keith than he thought. They were the size of his pinky and were shaped like cylinders, which meant they rolled around and got lost way too easily. He thought they should at least come with a clasp,  _ like the microphones do _ , but they came with a tiny lanyard instead. And how can someone tie a camera with a lanyard? And  _ where? _ The houses in all the precincts had flat sides. No ridges, nothing. There was nothing to  _ tie _ these on. So Keith hid them in the ground around the meeting place and went off to pay his respects to Cathalia.

When he gets to the funeral, it has already ended. He can see the flames rise from down the river and hear the mass of people leaving the area. Those leading the crowd out are the close family and friends of Cathalia. He’s easily able to spot Sigrun, long white hair in a high ponytail and the white embroidered cape clasped around her neck. She sees him just as quickly, despite his activated mask, and says her goodbyes to the party.

“I have something to show you,” she whispers, jogging up to him. Keith is taken back by the mood change. She grabs his wrist and pulls him towards the towering headquarters up ahead.

Once inside the headquarters, she starts running. Keith stumbles as her speed increases. Sigrun knowingly pushes people out of her way, but none of the Blades say anything to her.

“How important is this?” Keith asks breathlessly, hoping there’s good reason for all this running.

“Important,” she answers vaguely, pushing open the door to the messaging office and letting him go at last. Keith rubs at his wrist, a small ache pulsing around the area. Sigrun gets behind her desk and starts scourging, eyebrows creased in focus.

“How was the funeral?” Keith decides to ask. He wished he could be there, but installing those cameras were a priority.

Sigrun pauses, keeping her eyes away from Keith. “It was fine.”

The response is odd. Keith noticed that the death of Cathallia had been eating at Sigrun. She was her prison mate, her  _ friend.  _ Sigrun does her best to hide her grief. She’s been hiding it for two weeks now, but it’s hard for Keith not to identify. It was Cathallia’s final goodbye, so why would she just say “it was fine?” And why was she ready to leave the event so quickly?

“Do you want to talk about it?” Keith pushes. Sigrun is a talkative person, as he’s learned during their developing friendship.

“No,” she huffs.

Keith takes a few steps her way. “I know Cathallia’s death has been hard—”

“Keith.”

“—and all you’ve done is  _ told _ me about her—”

“ _ Keith. _ ”

“—but really, if you want to, I don’t know,  _ cry, _ it’s okay—”

“ _ I don’t want to talk about it! _ ” Sigrun yells, slamming her hands down on her desk. She stares directly at Keith with wide, watery eyes. She takes a deep breath. “I’m dealing with it  _ myself. _ ”

Keith freezes in place. He blinks and nods his head. He shouldn’t have pushed it, he thinks. Of course Sigrun would react badly! It’s too soon, isn’t it? Maybe Keith isn’t the person she wants to talk to. Maybe she would have gone to Cathallia in any other situation, but she can’t go to her anymore. Keith just wants to help her.

Sigrun places an object on the counter in front of her desk. “ _ This _ is important,” she sighs.

Keith slowly walks to the counter, observing the object. It’s an oval-shaped metallic device with a single, round button in the center. Keith turns it around and sees a dark purple insignia plastered onto the back. Three spikes—one at the top, two at the bottom—that connect to make a rectangular end. Inside the shape is a hollowed out triangle. He picks it up and looks at Sigrun for an explanation.

“That’s a letter in the Galra language.” She finger traces the lines. “This makes a ‘ma’ sound.”

“I’ve had enough with the Galra language, but thanks for the Galra fact.”

“Okay, then, next. Galra fact, I don’t know, twenty?” she questions, a small smile spreading on her face. “I lost count. Outside communication is forbidden on Veldis.”

Keith raises an eyebrow. “I knew that already.”

Sigrun rolls her eyes. “Young people are so stupid. This will connect you to the Altean castle.”

“Oh.” Keith repeats her words in his head again, the message finally sinking in. “ _ Oh! _ ”

“Stupid and slow,” Sigrun mumbles.

He can talk to the Alteans! He can ask them for help, see them again, finally have a somewhat physical conversation with someone from  _ Voltron! _ Keith has missed them two so much. He didn’t even realize it till now, knowing he’s one click away from talking to them.

“My goodness, the last time I saw a smile that big on your face, you were talking about your little crush on Lance,” Sigrun laughs, propping her chin on her hand.

Keith glares at her, then goes back to tinkering with the device. “So how does this work?”

“It’s a visual communicator that’s already pre-connected to the Altean castle’s signal. All you have to do is hold down that middle button, and when they answer, a hologram of them will appear. Make sure you only do this in your room though because, again, communication is forbidden.”

“Got it. Got it, got it, got it. Sigrun, thank you so much for this, you have  _ no _ idea how much I need this.” Keith stuffs the device in his pocket, snug against his notebook. “Get some rest tonight, okay?”

She gives him a pained smile and nods. Keith activates his mask and heads out to his room, grinning like a madman behind this cover.

This is good, this is  _ fantastic.  _ For one, he misses them. He hasn’t seen them since the team said goodbye and returned to Earth. The Castle isn’t  _ the _ home _ , _ per say, but Allura and Coran are family. They’re home in space. The Castle of Lions is a message in a bottle, something that holds so much and is lost in a great expanse of something so unexplored. They also have technology Keith better understands, since he’s spent the majority of his time in space maneuvering Altean tech.

The minute he’s inside his room, the mask is off and the device is out. Keith takes a deep breath, holds down the button, and waits.

And waits.

And...waits.

In the meantime, Keith chucks off his shoes and lies down on his bed. He stares at his thumb. His nail needs to be trimmed down. The device is also really small, Keith can barely hold it in a comfortable position.

Where could Sigrun get something like this? It definitely doesn’t look like Galra tech. It’s too simple, too  _ easy, _ but it may just be something used at the post office. Though outside communication is forbidden, Keith’s sure foreign planets contact Veldis for information or needs.

A static blue hologram appears above the device. Keith immediately sits up and smiles. Allura, Coran, and Lotor are crowded around the camera, directly looking at Keith. Allura’s hair is pinned back, as usual, and she looks as effervescent as ever. Coran wears his regular outfit, but his hair is slightly disheveled. Lotor’s hair is tied into a ponytail, but his signature loose strand is still perfectly in place across his face.

“Keith, my boy!” Coran greets, waving his hand in the air. “Hello!”

“What—how, what?” Lotor whispers, scanning the screen.

“Hello Keith,” Allura says with an excited tone. “How are you?”

“Hey,” Keith says fondly. Their accent is music to his ears. “I’m doing alright. Busy here on Veldis. How about you?”

“Oh, just taking care of Altea once again!” Coran answers. “The citizens are very excited to be back on our planet and are getting back into our traditions at full force!”

Must be nice, Keith thinks. Altea magically appearing after the war was possibly the greatest part about the end of it. The hidden Alteans throughout the galaxy came back and gathered into a society that is running incredibly smooth.

“How are you getting into contact with us?” Lotor asks. The connection makes his voice stutter and the hologram freezes momentarily. “Veldis doesn’t allow communication, do they?”

“No, but I find my way around. I need your help.”

“We are not going to Veldis.” Lotor crosses his arms. “They don’t like me. They will  _ slaughter _ me.”

Allura rolls her eyes and lightly nudges his side. “What do you need our help with?”

“I don’t need you to come to Veldis,” Keith states, skimming his notebook until he finds the right page. “I think you can maybe help me from Altea.”

Lotor seems suddenly intrigued, tapping his chin with his finger. “Do tell.”

Keith lowers his voice. “Veldis has been going through some troubles lately. We have reason to believe there’s a rebel group and they might be connected to the murders committed—”

“MURDERS?” all three gape in unison. 

“—yeah, murders. I’m leading an investigation and have been given some tools, but Galra tech makes no sense. I can’t understand it. All they’ve given me here is security footage, hidden cameras, and microphones I found on my own. None of it is really helping me. Do you think you have anything that can help me?”

“That’s all you are doing to find a murderer?” Allura blandly asks. “Looking at security footage? Doesn’t there need to be evidence collected?”

“I’m not in charge of that. Whatever evidence gathered from the bodies and crime scenes won’t be said to me unless it seems rebel-group like.”

“I believe we can scan the planet from above,” Coran chimes in.

“That requires moving the entire Castle off Altea,” Lotor reasons.

“We have other ships with the same technology.”

“But what will scanning do?” Keith asks. He can scan down here too. He doesn’t need to understand Galra to know that. “I need something viable. Do you think you can compile the data I have? I can tell you any information of the culprits I find. Your tech can probably do some nitty-gritty stuff I can’t do here. We make a good detective team anyways. Can you read Galran?”

“I’m right here,” Lotor deadpans. Sometimes Keith forgets he lives there now, being Allura’s boyfriend and all. He can’t fight it anyways. Guy saved his life, and they’re the only straight couple Keith can tolerate. “I can read Galran. You can’t? Haven’t you been there for months?”

Keith glares plainly at him. “Don’t worry about it, Lotor.”

Allura giggles behind her hand. Keith glares plainly at her too and she quickly changes her demeanor. “Keith, we’ll do everything we can to help, but I can’t guarantee any success. We’re not on Veldis with you. I don’t believe they will welcome us there either.”

“I know, it’s just…” He sighs and looks away. “I don’t want to do this alone.”

He was doing this alone. Kolivan could give him as many technical resources as he wanted, he could tell any and everything to Sigrun, he could write all about it to Lance, but Keith was still doing this alone. He used to do everything alone, but then he got used to having others help him. They listened well to each other, they made compromises, found success and failure and built themselves up time and time again. But now? Keith doesn’t have that. Doesn’t have  _ them. _ And he can admit he’s going to be lost sooner or later.

Allura sympathetically smiles. “You’re not doing this alone anymore.”

Keith looks at them one last time. They all sincerely look at him, even Lotor managing to pull the soft eyes at him. He thinks they know the feeling. Allura and Coran woke up one day and discovered they were the last living Alteans. Lotor was banished from his kingdom and wandered alone until he found his calling. These are the closest people he can connect to.

“Thank you.”

******

Kolivan presses play.

Keith stands nervously behind him, wishing the gloves of the Marmora suit didn’t block him from chewing on his fingernail. He diverts to rubbing his thumb over his clenched pointed finger, trying his absolute best to ease his anxiety.

He uninstalled the cameras in that backyard the following day and brought them to the meeting room. The memory cards have been plugged into the system and the footage is now to be watched. Because the cameras had to dug into the ground, the frame was tilted up, and the majority of the screen were made up of legs. Hopefully the other cameras managed to get their face.

“This is an awful angle,” some random Blade says in the room. Keith presses his lips together.

_ Don’t bite back, _ he tells himself.  _ Fight it. _

Kolivan looks over his shoulder to Keith, then goes back to watching the footage. The speakers only caught room noise. Everyone watches a few minutes of just legs until Kolivan gets tired and speeds up the video. Nothing changes. The video ends.

Kolivan glares over his shoulder once again. Keith meets ice-cold eyes and his entire body freezes over. There’s more footage. This just happens to be one. He planted, like, six cameras.

Still glaring at Keith, Kolivan goes onto the next video. A repeat of before, except with five pairs of shoes in frame. Next. The footage has dust all over the screen and the sound is practically mute. Next. Worst. Next.

This one, Keith managed to place in a good area. The camera was completely dug into the ground, lense facing towards the sky, and though the edges are black because of his attempt to make the camera less visible by covering it with dirt, a tunneled view smack in the center of their huddle show five hooded figures. Their faces are cast in shadows, meaning they can’t identify them, but the audio is the best so far despite how muffled it is.

“What do you think the weather will be like?” one of them asks.

“The same,” another replies. “I don’t know if this damn planet has seasons.”

“We haven’t experienced seasons,” a new voice says. “We lived on a ship.”

Again, Kolivan glares at Keith over his shoulder. He feels everybody’s eyes on him now, piercing into his skin and looking for something he doesn’t know of. The people in the footage continue talking about the weather. No names are said and nothing closely resembling rebel-like topics are mentioned.

“Are you sure you didn’t just catch a group of friends talking in their backyard?” Kolivan asks with a mild-mannered tone. “Are you sure you found some  _ rebels,  _ Keith?”

“I-I swear,” Keith stutters, “I swear they’re part of this rebel group. I’ve seen them do suspicious things—”

“‘Suspicious things?’” Kolivan walks towards him. Keith can’t see his expression because the room is still dark and the screen lights him from behind. “You also said you saw their faces, they passed around ‘mysterious’ pieces of paper, found new materials, and now these people are hooded and talking about the weather!” His voice gets louder and angrier with each word.

Keith takes a step back. He’s seen Kolivan mad before. He doesn’t physically lash out, he just sounds more intimidating. His inhuman height makes Keith feel small and trapped in a house about to collapse.

“And I  _ did, _ ” Keith says through gritted teeth. He’s never been one to go down without a fight. “I  _ did _ see that. I wouldn’t lie to you about it.”

“Well, we have no names, no rebel plans, nothing! The video footage of them passing around  _ papers _ makes more sense than this nonsense! You don’t know what you saw!”

“If you can’t trust my word, why trust me to find and disband a fucking rebel group!”

Keith clenches his fists and cranes his head up to equally glare back at Kolivan. He’s tired of this. More than once has he wanted to return to doing the basics—passing out materials, building houses in the precincts,  _ anything _ he used to think was repetitive. Keith complained about it to Lance back then, saying the pattern made the Veldis Task boring, but the tables have turned. He’d switch this leadership and distrustful duo with the boring and repetitive duo any day. If Kolivan doesn’t trust him, then what’s the point of telling him his findings?

Kolivan fails to respond, just keeps his yellow eyes steady on Keith. He backs away and flippantly walks back to the panel. The meeting room is dead silent.

“You can return to your duties,” Kolivan relents.

Keith huffs and turns on his heel to walk out. The door slides down as he enters the hallways of the headquarters. Immediately, he activates his mask and contemplates on where to go.

“Duties.” He doesn’t  _ have _ any duties. His duty is to investigate a rebel group forming amongst thousands of Galra people, each with a grudge against the Blade of Marmora and Keith, a half-human-half-Galra paladin who destroyed the only leader they’ve ever known. Really, Kolivan must have been on something when he assigned him this job.

Clearly the cameras were a mistake. Not  _ his _ mistake—a certain  _ someone _ insisted on them—but Keith needs to fix this. He’s positive they’re part of this rebel group and are planning something, whether Kolivan believes him or not.

The warehouse has tons of tools he doesn’t understand but needs. He remembers the box of microphones he made a dent in. The microphones are tiny but long range and if he manages to steal a few more things, he’s sure he can find a way to listen to the audio. If he has trouble, a quick call to the Castle of Lions can solve it.

Keith bolts towards the warehouse, shoving any Blade that gets in his way. He’s going to prove these people aren’t just a group of friends talking about the weather if it kills him. A yellow sky greets his unadjusted eyes, orange sky neatly blending and rising in the distance. Only a few Galra people are outside in the marketplace and not a single Blade is in sight.

Perfect.

The back warehouse door opens at the touch of his suit’s gloves. At a glance, it seems not much has changed since the last time he was in here, which means the microphones are hopefully in the same place. He heads to the right of them room where he remembers finding them.

Keith moves the boxes left and right, looking through the opened boxes to see if they have something else he might need. He finds a tablet with several ports and a paper notebook—which he’s even surprised to see—and takes them. Soon enough, he latches onto the dented box of microphones. There’s a plethora of them still inside. Keith hides the the tablet and notebook between all the wires and miniscule mics, seals the box to the best of his abilities, and leaves the warehouse.

The sky is slowly beginning to fade blue, meaning he doesn’t have long until materials pass out begins. He needs to make his way back to his room before it starts then, if everything goes to plan, he can install them when everyone’s out.

Sneers are thrown at Keith again as he pushes through the crowd of Blades getting ready to begin the day. He walks opposite of them, making the traffic harder to get through, but he eventually turns into the hallway his room is in. Once insides, he plops the box next to his door and deactivates his mask.

The clock suggests he has thirty minutes until the Galra start lining up. Keith opens up the box and examines a microphone. It’s cylindrical and about the size of his pinky. A foam windscreen envelopes it and there’s a detachable plastic clip. He takes the instruction manual and realizes he can’t read it.

Just as Keith goes over to open the cabinet that has his communication device, he hears a knock at his door.

He could ignore it. Go on with his plan, not be any steps behind, continue his secrecy— 

“I know you’re in there, Keith.” Sigrun’s wise, unfaltering voice. “You pushed past me.”

If he stays quiet, she’ll go away. She’s probably here to pass on a message from Kolivan, something about Keith’s inadequacy or rude attitude.

“I have Lance’s airplane thing.”

_ Lance. _

Keith trips on his own foot as he stumbles to let her in. The door slides open at the press of a button. Sigrun stands in her usual black and grey messenger uniform. Her white hair is tied up into a high ponytail, all possible loose hair gelled down to the sides. She seems unimpressed, eyes narrowed at him and eyebrow cocked up. In her hands is  _ Diablito _ glistening against the fluorescent lights of the hallway.

Keith waves at her. “Hey.”

“You’re a mess.”

Keith looks at his outfit. He washed it yesterday. “No I’m not.”

She rolls her eyes and hands him  _ Diablito. _ “Not what I meant, Keith.”

The weight of the plane is all familiar in the palms of his hand. The weight of Earth, the weight of Lance’s words, perhaps even a polaroid, condensed into a metallic drone that’s flown light years to get to him. Keith runs his fingers along the white rims.

“You’re smiling.”

He smiles wider and shakes his head. “Shut up.”

“How’d the mission go?”

_ Awful. _ There’s no point in exaggerating it. But it’s just one mistake, isn’t it? He should give himself some credit for even finding the location. “Could have been better.”

Sigrun puts her hand on his shoulder and lightly squeezes. “Sorry about that,” she whispers. “At least you got a cutie’s letter to make you happier.”

“Yeah, I do.” Keith happily sighs and looks at Sigrun. “Anything else for me?”

“Not that I know of.”

“Kolivan hasn’t told you anything?”

“No. Did you do something wrong?”

Keith scratches the back of his head. “I might have yelled at him?”

Sigrun chuckles and removes her hand from his shoulder. “Such a teenager.”

“I’m not even a teenager!” he argues.

She pokes the chest plate of Keith’s suit. “Galra are considered teenagers from ages twelve to twenty-two. Galra fact number...something.” Sigrun grins and walks away from his door.

Keith leans forward and watches her go. “That doesn’t make any sense, Sigrun!”

“I’ll see you around, teenager!”

He closes the door and bounces on the balls of his feet. Once upon a time, months ago now, Keith told Lance his favorite part about Veldis was the sky and its changing colors. If he were to ask him now, the answer would be different. It’d be  _ Diablito _ coming to his door. It’d be when he gets to sit down and read the hundreds of words Lance has taken out of his day to write to him.

The microphones can wait until tomorrow.

Keith sits on his bed and opens the metallic plane. Inside is a folded up letter, ink on both sides, and another polaroid. The picture has a purple flower taking up the bottom half. An immense amount of purple petals bloom over pristine green buds. In the far distance, blurred and out of focus, but well-intended to be in the photo, is Keith’s beat up home standing strong.

Lance went to his home.

Love and longing swells his heart in the best of ways. He desperately wants to be back there, blazing sun pleasantly shining through his windows, greasy humid air sneaking through the screens, snuggled up in his wonky bed with ViVi the hippo tightly held in his arms. His grandest wish is to have Lance there beside him, most likely cracking a joke about the place, adding a warm presence the shack has been missing for a while. Keith hopes he liked it there.

He puts the polaroid to the side and gets to reading.

_ “To: Lance” wow so formal are you? I gave up on that the moment your first letter came back to me. Too excited to go “to: Keith” you know?? Wait no you don’t you are still writing “to: Lance” just ignore this part. Were you not excited? Ouch, my pride! _

_ It’s not so much that I’m doubting my capabilities, it’s more like...like, what if a fucking comet hits Diablito? All my hard work gone up in flames. You know how space is. Floating stuff. Dangerous stuff. And, of course, a tiny metallic airplane going through it. So susceptible to danger. This thing is like our son now. _

_ Keith Kogane, risking it all for Lance Sanchez...love it. But really, I appreciate it. If you ever want to stop sending these letters because you’ll get caught or something, just let me know. I don’t want you getting in trouble because of me, especially since you’ve gotten busier. I won’t take it personally, promise. _

_ Honestly? Just be yourself. I think that way they’ll start listening if you’re your normal, hm, opinionated? self. As in, if you don’t hold back, the Blade will start paying attention. You’ve never been one to get your way by being different.  _

_ Iverson is a real dick. Matt came back to the main Garrison because he followed my hacking trails. I thought I was so good at erasing them! I’mma be honest with you and say I think he only found  _ _ one _ _ trail, not all of them. I’m not that bad. I know how to hack. Anyways, he had never seen the designs and trajectory equations either! And he’s a higher up! Hunk, Pidge, and Shiro also found out I was hacking into the Garrison because I was acting “suspicious.” It really be like that sometimes. Point is Iverson is hiding something and  _ _ we are onto him. _ _ Our investigation is called “The Heist.” Will keep you updated ;) _

_ Mmm, you can make up as many excuses about your ASL abilities, and I will prove them wrong. Hunk is taking ASL because he has an extra free class. I can look in his textbook whenever I please. I can even ask him! I’m going to ask him what the sign for traveler is, and if he can give it to me, you are no longer allowed to make excuses. HA. _

_ Tell your Galra friend I love her and I owe her all my life’s earnings. Seriously. Can’t believe you found someone down to break some Blade of Marmora laws. That’s fucking sick. Is she nice? I have this awful stereotype ingrained in my head that every Galra person is mean or really cold toward everybody. And, rightfully so, dude. You and Lotor are the only Galras I’ve seen :) or :D or  _ _ ｡^‿^｡. Why is that. Does she smile? I hope she smiles. What’s her name? _

_ I did start school and it’s weird dude. I got planetary science, calculus, TA (to SHIRO the TEACHER), astronomy, flight class, and astrophysics. Shiro’s kids are spoiled brats that I wish I didn’t have to interact with. I accidentally started a fight in his class too? Yeah they don’t really like me, Keith. Hunk, however, is the TA to Iverson. And Iverson is kissing a s s. Hunk is a TA for his flight class and he had Hunk teach the kids how to use the simulator. That is SPECIFICALLY Iverson’s thing! He’d never let anybody but him do that in a million years, but he lets  _ _ Hunk _ _ do it? Mysterious right? And he gave him a pat on the back. Maybe Iverson’s a clone or somethin. _

_ The only problem with my schedule is flight class. I love flying—we all do—but it’s different now. What can I compare it to? Like, okay, you like fries. Let’s say some Galra food closely resembles fries, from the shape down to the way it’s presented. You’re super excited to try it and when you do it tastes like broccoli. Everything about it is suddenly wrong and you yearn for the real thing. That’s what flight class feels like. We don’t want to fly again. Or at least not right now. When we flew, it wasn’t to explore a brand new moon and collect crystal data. It was to face an enemy ready to take us dead or alive. I love flying, love the adrenaline and all, but the simulation isn’t it. Maybe if I went back to space and flew again I’d feel differently. _

_ I always admired space. I never pictured I’d be flying a space lion in it, but I remember that day Blue took us there and the invincible-ness of it all. And as homesick as I was, I really did love being in space. The whole war thing wasn’t cool but waking up to the stars kind of was. Knowing I went to school for this and now I was in space and all? Illegally, probably? It was exciting. _

_ Sometimes I want to go back. I want to go back and travel space differently. It feels like I’ve seen all of it already but I know I haven’t. It’s so big and enigmatic I just  _ _ have _ _ to return. I also miss all the people I met out in space. The rebels, Allura, Coran, even Lotor. It’s peaceful now and I want to experience it. That pending danger we were so acutely aware of is gone. We can hang out as friends, go watch a foreign film and vaguely understand the plot. I want to find a beach! I want to hike mountains! Play in the snow! It doesn’t sound so bad, huh? _

_ You’re in space. I’m not entirely sure if you’ve done any of this because of the Veldis Task, but if I could fly back and take you out for a few days, I’d check off that list with you. We deserve it. I’ve got this hunch that Veldis isn’t as fun as, say, the space mall. I bet you need the day off. Week off even. _

_ Also, I miss Blue. And Red. And Black. Can you believe I went through three lions? I really thought it’d be Blue and me forever, but then it was Red and me, and I thought okay, this is it, then Black was like “wassup BITCH” and i just kinda rolled with it. You know for a while I was unsure about being leader and I’d go to you about it. Your words made it a lot easier. You’re really good at reassuring people. Do you know that? You’ve got a way with words and it amazes me everytime. Even now with you telling me to be careful about hacking! Like, that’s the kindest way you could have disagreed and simultaneously agreed with me about it. And how you described the stars in the other letter? Really, Keith, your writing and drawing skills are best shown on paper. You’re incredible. _

_ The expanse of space is like my second home. You spend so long in one place that when you leave it, you forget how much you miss it. It’s how you’re feeling about Earth, and what I’m feeling about space. _

_ Space has you. Earth doesn’t. It’s kinda fucked. We’re so far from each other. I miss having you by my side, making you laugh. I even miss the food goo fights and our old bickering. Bicker with me Keith! _

_ I have ran on about space as you did so with Earth. You are star boy and Earth lad and I am moon boy and space lad. We are equal now. _

_ TELL ME HOW YOU GOT EXPELLED FROM THE GARRISON! A lot of the rumors were really extreme but some of them weren’t. The most popular one was that you’re the one who took out Iverson’s eye. That one seems a bit extreme but, uh, you tell me fam. Another was you ruined Iverson’s office, you sent very meanly worded letters to Montgomery (someone had to do it), broke a simulator, punched several kids in a fight that  _ _ somehow _ _ went unrecorded, and stole a shit load of things from the Garrison. That last one seems the most likely because sOmeBodY built their own shack and shit with stolen materials. AND STOLE A WHOLE ASS SPEEDER? What the actual fuck? Keith the Thief. You’re so chaotic. Lactose intolerant yet you still down milk like a champ. Did your toilet seat ever break? My sister is lactose intolerant but she would cut someone’s leg for a milkshake and then no one could use the bathroom for an hour after she did because my God the smell...the SMELL. _

_ Before we get into the nitty gritty personal stuff, I do have to say I’m surprised by some of your facts. I didn’t know you were in the foster system. I don’t really know anything about it but I have a feeling you weren’t a fan. I think I wouldn’t mind your music for one either. My music taste is probably as messy as yours. I can make this a competition if you’d like. _

_ And...boyfriend, huh? Can’t say I’m entirely surprised. You weren’t exactly subtle all the time. You might have thought so but I have hawk eyes. What was this boyfriend like? I love gossip. _

_ 20 facts about moi: _

  * _My favorite color isn’t blue. Take a wild guess._


  * I, much like my sister, would cut someone’s leg for my favorite food too: a basket of garlic knots. Seasoned just right. I can eat garlic knots like they’re fries.


  * I have a mild allergy to grass. If I’m near grass I’ll get teary-eyed and constantly sniffle. Hence why my go-to locations are the beach and desert. 


  * I’ve got three (3) older siblings and one (1) younger sibling. My oldest brother is 29, my twin sisters are 24, I’m 20, and my little brother is 8! Don’t ask how old my parents are. I won’t respond.


  * Born in Cuba. I have a strong feeling you already knew that because of how often I talked about Cuba, but we live in America and people constantly forget that not every citizen is born here. Example: me and my three older siblings.


  * I used to raise stray cats too! They were named Pantera and Tigre. Had to leave them when I came to the US. It sucked.


  * I got interested in flight school because my mom kind of taught me to. She always wanted to explore space but never had the tools or money. I think she saw I was interested and taught me everything she knew. I fulfilled her dream for her. She didn’t push me to do it. I wanted to do it. It felt natural.


  * My plan B was to become a movie director. Plan A was obviously the Garrison but if they didn’t take me, I would have applied to film school. Good thing plan A worked out lol


  * I used to hate avocados when I was little, but then I had an avocado burger and I was like holy shit????? My life changed


  * Deathly afraid of spiders. Who the F U C K thought spiders were a good thing. I don’t know how people just see a spider make themselves a web in their bedroom and are chill with it.


  * My first girlfriend was this girl who lived down the street from us and had gone to school with me since I came to America. Started dating first year of highschool. She made fun of my English and I dumped her real quick


  * My second girlfriend was not my girlfriend for long. Three weeks in and I realized I didn’t like her.


  * I liked her brother a lot tho. He was unfortunately straight. Never been more disappointed.


  * That’s when I figured out I’m bi


  * I got a shark plushie at home named Bruce. It was marketed as a sleeping bag but in reality it’s just a really big shark toy that can eat you. I love him so much.


  * I like being taller than you.


  * I pierced my ears when I was fourteen. It was a popular thing back then. The holes closed up pretty quick. Money: wasted


  * I’m really good at math I just hate learning it. It’s definitely the worst class out there because the majority of teachers don’t know how to teach it.


  * People used to think I wore blue eye contacts everyday because “there was no way a Latino had blue eyes” and I got so tired of it that I stopped arguing and let them believe it.


  * No one ever called me “the tailor” i made that shit up. But it sounded cool huh



_ In case you haven’t figured it out from the polaroid, I am currently writing this in front of your shack. You missing Earth made me think of it and I thought I’d come for a visit. I’m not trespassing or breaking in, so I can only tell you about how the outside is looking. Still as desolate as ever. There’s also some Texas Rangers growing out in front, which is so fitting. Shack’s still standing though. There’s probably a huge snake roaming around inside and a lot of dust. Do you have keys to it or something? I can go check it out if you want me to. It looks like it misses you. _

_ I still miss you too. October 23 should be passed by the time your next letter gets to me, so happy early birthday Keith. When you come back, you can buy me some booze. _

_ Stay safe out there Star Boy, _

_ Moon Boy _

******

Keith has always been quiet and reserved. He likes to keep to himself and let as little information about him spill out into the world. He’s simple-minded and has spent much of his life alone. There are very few instances when he needs to be vocal about his most personal feelings. In his nearly twenty-one years of life, he’s only been able to confide in Shiro and Lance.

So Keith sprinting to the messaging office to tell Sigrun about how Lance makes his heart want to jump out of his throat makes no sense.

In the past, he would have told Shiro about these feelings. Gone on and on about Lance’s toothy grin and how his entire body lit on fire when he saw it, quickly knocked on his bedroom door until Shiro let him in and paced back and forth about how sometimes he wanted to shut Lance up with his lips. Shiro isn’t on Veldis for him to do that.

He can’t write to Lance about his feelings about him. One, it’s too soon for him to do that. Keith never confessed and he’s going to keep it like that for now. Two, getting a response would take too long. He’d be stuck in tense limbo for weeks, juggling every possible scenario in his head and then being too nervous to read the letter when it got to him.

Sigrun is the only person he’s gotten close to here. Keith’s told her bits and pieces about himself and vice versa. Wanting to go to her to rant makes a little sense. He’s always felt the need to tell  _ someone _ about his crush on Lance. Keith trusts Sigrun more than anyone else on this planet.

The messaging office is warmly lit by the sun shining through the window. Behind the counter, Sigrun aimlessly spins in her chair behind a desk, humming a song and staring at the ceiling, hair swaying along with the movement. Keith clears his throat to catch her attention. She looks toward the door and smiles.

“Hello,” she says.

Keith deactivates his mask and strides to the counter. “Are you busy?”

“No. The only mail today was yours.”

“Can I talk to you?”

Sigrun pauses and straightens up. “Is something wrong?”

“No!” Keith waves his hands in front of him. “No, not at all, just wanted to talk.”

Golden eyes squint at him. “About?”

He lowers his head. “Lance?” he mumbles.

Sigrun rises from her chair and marches over to the counter. She pushes Keith’s forehead, making him tilt up and face her teasing expression. “What’d you say?”

“Lance?” His voice cracks, but it sounds more confident than before.

With a smile, Sigrun unlocks the gate that separates the waiting area from the office and lets Keith in. She rolls her chair over to the center and takes a seat. Keith leans against the counter and takes a closer look at her office. Color-coded pens are neatly arranged on Sigrun’s desk next to a notepad and tablet. The rest of the space is filled with labeled boxes.

“So?” she breaks through. “Lance?”

Keith takes out the polaroid from his pocket and hands it to her. It looks so small in her giant Galra hands. She holds it close to her face.

“He went to the shack I used to live in and wrote the letter,” Keith brings up. “I grew up there. It’s where my mom and dad lived. Then I came in and my mom had to go, so it was just me and my dad. Dad had drinking problems and I was taken away from him. I went back there after my school kicked me out and was surprised to find it still standing. I think my dad abandoned it some time ago.”

Sigrun hums. “So Lance went to your home.”

“Yeah! Because I told him I missed home and he thought of it.”

“Does he know you lived there when you were little?”

“No, I told him I built it.”

She looks Keith up and down, then hands him back the polaroid. “You lied to him.”

“Not entirely!” Keith crosses his arms. “When I went back, it needed some reinforcements, so I built them in. I kept it standing. Point is Lance sent me a picture of my home because I told him I missed it. He  _ thought _ of me.”

Sigrun clicks her tongue. “I told you that before.”

“I know, I know.” Keith begins pacing back and forth to calm his nerves. “It’s just—I don’t know! He gives me nicknames. Shiro tried making the nickname Keefy stick when I was younger but I never let that happen. I hated nicknames, but here Lance goes calling me ‘star boy’ and ‘earth lad’ and they’re both so  _ stupid _ but just reading them makes me want to backflip off a cliff. And he’s so sweet! He said he wants to explore space again but this time with me and—” He stops in his tracks and groans, putting his palms to his eyes. “He’s going to be the death of me, Sigrun.”

Her giggle pierces through the air. “You’re so dramatic.”

Keith watches her spin in her chair again. A pressing fact—one of the twenty that he had to read over and over again until his brain comprehended and believed the words—arises.

“He’s bi.”

Right, he came out to Lance before. Writing the fact down made his fingers tremble anxiously, but he also has enough trust and faith in Lance. He claimed he “figured” anyways, so it’s no biggie. What’s important is that Lance isn’t straight. Lance likes guys. Keith has a small, miniscule, microscopic chance of being the apple of Lance’s eyes.

Sigrun waves out to him, trying to grab his attention. Keith blinks and grins at her. “He’s bi!” he exclaims.

“You told me he was Cuban,” she says.

“He is! He’s Cuban too, why wouldn’t he—you don’t know what bi means.”

Sigrun shakes her head. Strands of white hair land over her shoulders.

“It means I have a chance. He likes guys.”

“Ah.” She wags her finger at him and nods. “That’s right, humans care about that kind of stuff. I forgot. I don’t think him not liking guys would have stopped you from anything, though.”

“What makes you think that?”

“You’re very persistent.”

Keith decides against arguing. He hyper focuses on the idea of a  _ chance. _ He’s thought about being with Lance several times before. Holding his hand as they stroll down a beach at sunset. His arms wrapped around Keith’s waist as he drives his speeder through a barren desert. Waking up to Lance cooking something up in the shack. His insides twist at his imaginations.

“Such a teenager.”

******

The following morning, Keith stuffs one single microphone into his pocket and heads out to the Eastern Precinct. Galra line up for miles to receive their daily bag of materials. The sky is blue and the sun is high. No time better than the present.

Lotor explained to him how the microphones work. They’re fancier versions of a bluetooth connector except with farther range and auto-saving abilities. Keith connected the mics to his newly stolen tablet and prayed to every and any deity for luck.

The bland, picture-perfect house is easy to find. He still remembers the location of it from a few days ago. It’s quiet and tranquil, meaning the precinct should be empty. Keith heads toward the backyard fence and takes out the microphone. He switches it on then drops it inside.

Keith stays up all night waiting for the audio to come through. Heavy eyelids threaten to shut, but he busies himself with writing back to Lance. There’s questions left to be answered and more to let Lance know about.

The Kogane family is a touchy subject. He doesn’t remember much about being a part of it. Stargazing, bedtime stories, and faintly sung lullabies are all that come to memory. A drunken father slumped against the dining table, beer bottle in hand, mumbling a slur of English and Korean words directed at him. The black van parked outside his home, a nice lady with blonde hair and a green dress on telling Keith he’s going away for a while. His dad somewhere, half aware of what’s happening, asking where they’re taking his son.

Keith wants to get it off his chest and onto paper. It’s been twenty years of pent up confusion and uncertainty about forgiving his father. He never wanted to burden Shiro with the information. Shiro was a protective brother figure that was very sensitive to Keith’s situation. It angered him when his foster home wasn’t right for Keith and nothing seemed to be working out for him. Having been his mentor for all of his teenage years made him a little biased. Talking about his family with Lance, someone who knows the meaning of family best, seems like a good route to take.

“Let’s begin this meeting,” a deep voice rumbles from his tablet.

Keith jolts awake. He scrambles to grab his notebook to the side.

“Is Nedra coming this time?’ a monotone voice asks.

“No. She said that last time was too close a call and wants no part of this anymore.”

Keith diligently takes notes.

“Someone else will deal with her, then. Did anything suspicious happen here today?”

No response. Perhaps it was answered with a nod.

“Autopsy results of Cathallia, Thorynx, Keres, and Fia say they all died of natural causes,” a new, higher pitched voice mentions. “Do we have enough supply on the poison in case we need to do this again?”

“Plenty. Don’t worry about it. We need to focus on adding more members to this cause. There are too little of us. We won’t get anything done this way.”

“And how will we do that?”

“You have your communicators. If you come up with an idea, comm in and the team will take note. Once we have enough members, we can continue with our mission.”

“The Markku must be successful for the Blade of Marmora regime to end.”

******


	6. the rest

i am going to, essentially, copy and paste my outline. it will make 0 sense probably but it is what it is

krolia was not introduced yet so i made up keith's mom—quirina. she is nothing like krolia lmao

  * **CH6** Keith’s loneliness (mention family beginnings). 
    * Halloween. They go trick or treating in the dorms. Find out who make designs. adam(?) is mentioned, they are reconciling. Adam made the designs years ago.
  * **CH7** Lance consoling keith in his loneliness and giving updates on his friends to cheer him up, also coordinate change! Tells about his family.
    * Keith completely ditches telling the bom about his findings. Team altea and him figure out the next moves. Asks sigrun about device, she’s very vague about it. Nightmare from war
  * **CH8** Keith telling him how he caught up with allura, lotor and coran (not mentioning their help with markku). 
    * Xmas. lance is at home. Emilia graduates! His family finds out about the hacking AND the airplane. They are all like….you like him. And he’s like yeah as a friend! But it doesnt feel right. Somehow devolves into the war and keith together. Garrison announces “the atlas” a space ship that can travel basically what lance had already made. seems...expensive
  * CH9 Lance feels he should talk about the war (final battle). 
    * Keith attempts to find Morfran and Bruns and interrogate them (casually). Kolivan catches him handing out materials in the eastern precinct and is like you’re not supposed to be doing this?? You haven’t checked the footage in days. We have new sightings. Keith checks it out and basically they’ve infiltrated the materials warehouse in the dead of the night. No alarms went off or anything. Keith asks allura to send him stuff because they stole literally everything he uses (she agrees.) keith asks sigrun what she used to do in bom, she was an engineer. End chapter w/ nedra death.
  * CH 10 Keith does so too after he receives this letter. 
    * Hunk’s bday. Iverson gives him a reaaaally big gift, and they’re all hyper analyzing it. He’s clearly kissing up. Adam told them he made the designs post kerberos and never saw them reach the light of day. Adam and shiro are much visibly closer. He doesnt know who did all the math to get them to travel so far. Him and matt do that research, which makes them become closer friends!!!! They find mfe fighters who all worked together to make that math and all, were told by iverson “he’d use them in well time.” lance hacks and finds a schedule of future releases within the next year. It’s a looooot. How did the garrison get this money?
  * CH 11 Lance telling him about the information he’s gotten from hacking, and how he should expose. 
    * Sigrun has been acting jittery ever since nedra and keith checks up on her. She completely ignores the reconciling and asks if the bom has gotten any evidence on her murder. Keith thinks she wants justice, but she’s afraid they’ll find out she killed her. Team altea hasn’t sent him jack shit lol. When he goes to check footage, team altea is there with only kolivan. They request for keith only to give them a tour of the place, he gets them bom suits and he gives them a tour aka here is everything about the mission. They take their masks off (temporarily) and the galras are like alTEanS and cause a scene and the bom has to come in and get them out. Kolivan is super duper fucking pissed and takes keith off the mission. Allura had some super rad mic on the throughout the whole thing and managed to grab some audio about the markku. Coran was filming and they managed to ID morfran and bruns. They think the alteans are here for governmental stuff like an alliance and they dont want that. Mention they need to ask “her” if she knows anything about it and how they should diverge. Now they have to figure out who “her” is. The next day team altea asks keith if he could join them for a meeting with bom. Them and a few other diplomats ask to be part of an alliance.
  * CH 12 Keith wanting to reestablish his relationship with shiro. 
    * They find out about a meeting iverson is holding with the international committee and pidge and lance hide in the vents. He announces to them the new upcoming designs. He’s asked about how he got the money and he said it was all donated. The heist team goes out for a little drive (a well deserved break -adashi). Pidge asks how they got back together and what they were like before, both mention keith and raising him, etc. lance is the most interested and they’re like o kaY we get it you like him and he’s like i dont. I dont LIKE like WHAT basically leslies when ron asks her about ben dkjfhsd. Adam says there was never any donations accepted...except the ones when they asked for donations to find missing team voltron. Lance does a little more hacking bc he’s angry and finds body cam footage of kerberos in hidden garrison files. 
  * CH13 Lance telling him that he never told anybody about these letters and giving his reasons why. Feels like a dick about it, but saying he relayed his messages to them as best as he could
    * After the alliance is announced, keith is surprised there is little commotion. He asks sigrun what she thinks about it and she’s indifferent. He asks if he can spend the day there bc he’s avoiding kolivan and she agrees. This is when she teaches him how to use his galra abilities (night vision and thermal vision). Not all galra have this, but she figured he might (bc quirina did). Team altea informs him that they received a mysterious explosive package that didn’t look like bom or altea tech at all. Keith overhears information about the murders committed, at last: all lived in eastern precinct and were poisoned. He returns to the roof to find the backyard is packed with boxes. Stupidly enough, he goes to sigrun and asks what she knows about her neighbors. He spills that he’s been looking at two guys from here that have been quite suspicious for the past couple of months, just nothing big has happened for the bom to prosecute them. He also goes off about lance and letter and shiro lol.
  * CH 14 Keith tells him how he was kinda mad about that, but then understands (bc keith already rlly likes him at this point and he thinks it’s sweet that he wanted to keep it between them)
    * Heist scours for all of the infor. Transfer kerberos footage into hard drive. Shiro finds bank records of donations meant to be used to find voltron paladins and it never being used. Rather, it was saved to create these fighter jets. So iverson embezzled money meant to look for voltron, said they were for sure dead rather than look, and lied to their families. The release the information and the entire garrison has to fucking shut down. Iverson is taken to court. All that fun stuff. The team is sat down and interviewed, asked about the aliens and all. It’s not fun for them but they do their best.
  * CH15 Lance exposes the garrison and tells keith all about it!
    * The entire eastern precinct has been relocated, but it’s taking forever. The warehouse is blown up and riots have been taking place. Back-up from other planets hasn’t been sent because the alliance hasn’t fully been put into place. Keith has been shut into the headquarters and contacts altea a lot. Sigrun checks on him to give the airplane. She warns him something bad is going to happen, and if he could find a way out, he should. Keith tells her about the markku. She says nothing. That night, the headquarters is infiltrated by hoards of galra with an insignia on their outfit, same as the button. They capture keith.
  * CH16 Keith congratulates him, but mentions his task and the markku, it’s hella short and vague
    * This is the last letter before they get him
    * Lance sends him one back with LOTS of concern, never gets a letter back 
    * Lance is freakin out over not getting a letter back (it’s been a month and a half--wait is 2-3 weeks). This is when black approaches him. Hunk and pidge are there, and lance figures out keith’s in trouble. He’s like ‘come with me!!’ but they’re like no,,,this is something _you’ve_ been chosen to do. Go save him loverboy (emphasis on love bc damn is he dumb)
  * CH17 Yeah keith is in trouble the markuu had a rising and they captured keith and kolivan. Explain how in detail, then explain his current situations: stuck in a cell, fed a little, :/, then sigrun comes in and he’s like oh thank god you’re here to save me!! And she’s like oh no lol i’m here to check on you. I put you in here.
  * CH18 Black takes lance back to the castle. He gets out and there waiting for him are allura, coran, and lotor!! Allura is like w t f i was wondering why black left and all and point is lance is like WHERE THE FUCK IS KEITH. They figure it out and lance is on his fuCKin way. Black with invisible shit drops lance off and he’s so lost. Finds help with a little galra girl who leads him to the underground cells.
  * CH19 Sigrun visits and tells keith about how he truly helped her by giving her information and such. Kolivan glares at him the whole time. Keith decides to bare his fangs, and sigrun is like woah! your mama hated her fangs! And then she goes off about quirina. At the end lance find the cells And sigrun is just like,,,oh, is this him? the one you've been sending letters too? Hello
  * CH20 Lance should be smiling but keith looks so fucking dead that he’s more pissed than anything!!! anyways bayArd UP and ready to shoot and sigrun laughs and keith is just shaking his head like dont,,dont do it. Anyways sigrun and him talk a lil she’s just being a bitch but lance _wants_ to stall her bc he told allura that the lil girl would send a signal and once she got it to comm in but **nothing is happening** and sigrun threatens to shoot keith and lance is NOOO but deep down sigrun doesn’t want to kill keith so she compromises and lance is now in the dungeon with keith and sigrun takes kolivan and lance’s bayard. Despite the situation klance shit happens and they’re hugging and all ahhhh we love their first interaction. For two days, they catch up,and that’s when lance is like oh no……..i like u
  * CH21 Sigrun comes to visit w bayard to be a bitch, again, but that’s when allura basically blasts at the site and the stuff starts to rumble and crumble. Lance gets back his bayard bc she’s dumb and lance shoots sigrun’s leg so she can’t escape, shoots the locks open and gets them out via secret tunnel lil galra girl told him about. allura and coran out on the castle. It’s looking pretty hopeless. Keith drags sigrun out with him and keith basically force information out of sigrun and wELL there’s a bomb. Supposed to blow up all that’s been built by the bom. Keith, kolivan, lance, and castle team are tryna figure out how to defuse the bomb and it isn’t working. Kolivan and bom are tryna safely evacuate everybody but the markku is actually waaaaaaay more than they thought. Keith and lance go into the headquarters and lance is guiding everyone out and telling them where to go and keith rUNS to his room and gets all the letters, all the polaroids and when he finds lance is like what the FUCK! Time is running oUT what did you go fiND and he’s like i can’t lose these and he shows him the letters and lance is just like. That’s sweet but are you serious time is running out and keith is like i know but i couldn’t be without them,,,,not right now.
  * CH22 Lance is like Oh My Fucking God I Think I’m In Love With You and everything in him is confused now but BIGGER PICTURE we have to get,,,out of here and figure out what to do with the bomb. Lance is like okay i’m going to grab the bomb and throw it as far as possible with my lion. You focus on getting everyone out. And he tries but the time is going lower and lower and there wasn’t going to be enough time and keith comms into lance and he’s like there isn’t enough time and i have to do something lance and lance is like keith dont DO THIS AGAIN and in his head he’s like i can’t let him hurt himself again not after months of reconnecting and waiting for him to just come back home and you know you’ll probs know what to write in the moment anyways he sees keith running towards the bomb in a vehicle and lance is YELLING AT HIM to move and keith sees him and he brakes and lance is getting faster and faster and right as he covers the bomb and it explodes.
  * CH23 Keith watches as nothing detonates because black basically shields the detonation but he’s thrown at such a far distance and black tumbles and echoes. Keith looks around and all there is is a hole in the ground and the remains of the bomb and keith is fucking SPEEDING to black and he gets there and black is barely responsive and he’s just _beggin_ with tears in his eyes to open up like please i was your paladin too and black, with the last of what she has, opens up. Lance’s helmet is dented and his armor is just fucked up and his face is a lil bloody and keith puts on the helmet and is begging for allura to answer and she does but it’ll take her some time to get there and he’s just god damMit and dragging him out and lance needs help asap can someone, anything,,, and then he hears a roar and he’s like??? Black???? Then he looks at the sky and it’s red!!!!!!!! He puts them in the lion and allura is like keith!!! We’re almost done here but i can’t aid to you right now please just wait a little and he just rides around space crying with lance in his lap. He has a pulse and low soft breathing but he’s definitely unconscious and he’s just crying. So much. He hears faintly that it’s safe for him to return in red, that they pulled black back into the palace.
  * CH 24 Lance has a dream about being at home. He goes through a whole day with his family. and at the end of the day, he reminds them how much he loves them.
  * CH 25 Keith wakes up from his sleep at the healing pods in front of lance’s. He’s as rested and sleeping as before. He goes to have breakfast with allura and coran and they update him on black. They advise him that maybe he should sleep on the bed instead of the floor. He shoves it away. He’s on his way to the training sector when he sees lotor standing in front of the door to the prison. He’s like what you doing. Lotor is like “i heard sigrun is here. I want to see her.” and keith is like shit imma join you. They go in and lotor stares at her and she stares back and keith is so confused and he’s like “so escaping my father’s enslavement got you in the same position you began.” and keith is like wOah okay. Lotor’s basically getting her on the edge and she’s just yelling at him to shut up and keith is like yeah i hate her too but you should definitely go,,,, so he leaves and keith is left with her and he’s like. I thought we were good friends. Something about mother figure. What happened. And basically she was like tbh i knew who you were since my eyes laid on you. The son of quirina. Quirina was everything to me and seeing you meant you were all that was left of her. I had to protect it. I really i could have killed you off or something but you became my friend. And you were my enemy! You were on my _kill list_. But everytime i had the courage to kill you, the want, the _power,_ i looked at you and all i saw was quirina. i couldn’t hurt you because i loved our friendship. And i loved your mother. I couldn’t let her down. And keith is just like well im sure you fuckin did. Thanks for trying though. You taught me a lot but because of you people are dead and the person i’ve cared immensely for for three years is stuck in a healing pod. So i d k. Anyways end of the day and he’s looking at lance again and ‘talking to him.’ he says ‘i care about you. I’m in this weird place between liking you and loving you and I think I’ll figure it out when you come back to me. And for us to go back home….we need you to wake up. _I_ need you to wake up.’
  * CH 26 Lance is at the garrison. He goes through his whole regular schedule, but when they go to shiro’s room EVERYONE is there. Even lotor. And they’re having a good old time and for lance tells everyone he loves them. He looks at keith a little longer and says ‘you know that, right?’ and he goes back to his dorm and he gets a knock and it’s keith and he says ‘i know. I care about you. I’m in this weird place between liking you and love you and i think i’ll figure it out when you come back to me. And for us to go back home….we need you to wake up. _I_ need you to wake up.’ and lance wakes up, and the healing pod opens, and keith turns around. He looks around and stumbles forward. He looks up at keith and finds the words to say but his head is spinning and he feels very different.
  * Ch 27 Keith rUNSSSSSS UP TO HIM and is like ohmygoD! Oh my god you’re up and awake holy shit are you okay pls tell me you are fine and all lance says is “cold. i’m cold” and keith takes him to his room and tucks him in and goes back to his room. He manages to sleep comfortable now but in the middle of the night there’s a knock at his door and it’s lance and he just keeps repeating im cold im cold im cold and he’s sleepy and he just drags keith down into his bed and sleeps. Keith is nervous but puts an arm over him and falls asleep so fast. He wakes up to an empty bed and rushes out of bed. Lance is eating and catching up with allura and coran and lotor, eating breakfast. He smiles at keith, grabs a plate, and takes him to the nearest window of the castle. They sit and eat and lance talks about the letters and all. Keith does too. They bring up some of them and ask about them. Lance tells him about the last letter and how it scared the shit out of him. He sent a letter back--did he get it back? Keith shakes his head and comes up with a plan. At the end of the day he goes to sigrun’s cell and asks him about diablito. She says she left it back at the headquarters. Keith takes red to veldis. He confronts the bom and blah blah blah. Gets back diablito and hides it in his room. Tbh he’s too scared to read it.
  * CH 28 Lance unwillingly asks Keith if he can sleep in his bed again. Lance is very confused about his feelings though he thinks he has most of it figured out but he has to do this because it helps him sleep better at night. At first he was cold, but then when he slept in his bed he felt trapped in the healing pod again and those dreams where he had to remind his family and friends he loved them. With keith he slept fine and at peace. He sleeps there for a few days straight and asks keith if he can go see sigrun with him. Keith agrees and she laughs when she sees him. He said he just wanted to face her. Wanted to know why she fought back against the bom. She answers, saying it was unfair that they had complete control of those who suffered. She rolls her eyes though and is like but aren’t you oblivious? It’s what i’ve been told. You’re so oblivious lance. Someone who loves and cares about you stands right in front of you and you deny yourself the pleasures of it because you’re stuck thinking about the past. Rivalry, huh? Still stuck on that? Stuck on your pride? The person i loved was stuck thinking about something she left behind. And keith is like time 2 go wtf man and lance is piecing the puzzle and is asking questions like ‘what does she mean im oblivious’ etc etc.
  * CH 29 Keith goes to sigrun in the middle of the night and he’s like……...you fucking suck. You have nothing to with that and no right to barge in, despite all they talked about back then. Open up with letter and keith’s reaction to it. Keith and lance are listening to coran tell them how long they have to reach earth. It’s about two more day, but they’re close. They do everything they can for the last time. Eat goo. Play the video game. Sit in their lions for the last time. Say goodbye to their lions. Spar in the training room. They fight each other and cute shit. Keith thanks him. Thanks him for contacting him and coming to veldis and saving him...just a big fucking thanks. Mention letter. And lance is like dude, thank _you._ For literally everything for being a pillar i can lean on and for entrusting me and vice versa, for replying to my stupid letters and risking it all to do so. I’d do it all again if i had to. Keith is smiling like a dumb ass and lance looks nervous? And confused? And keith tells him he likes him. Loves him, actually. And lance panics. And keith is like “??? Hello??” And lance runs
  * CH 30 It’s later that day and lance has had time to think. He left keith upset and he had to fix it, tell he likes him to, and hell, probably loves him too, but it freaked him out. He approaches keith looking out at space and it’s just silent. keith asks “you’ve really never felt the same way?” and lance is like….explain. And keith tells him how he feels about lance. Lance tells him about his dream in the pod, and how he looked at keith and told him he loved him. Lance basically outlines what he feels for keith, and how it took him so long to realize it bc he’s just oblivious, and never really opened himself up to love. He tells him why he panicked and stuff. But then he’s like but i have felt that way, i just masked it as something else, not bc i didnt like you, but bc i wouldnt let myself get hurt. Mention line from pod.And he looks and keith and he’s SMILING SO MUCH and he just. Scoots and KISSES THAT MAN. Next day, They get back to earth and are left at the garrison. Allura and them made a video message and she, too, figured out a way to keep in contact with them. It’s the end of the school day and lance is like, let’s go say hi to them. And keith is like who? And lance smiles and they’re running to shiro’s room and there they are. There is _everybody_
  * CH 31 Keith is saying hello to everybody and it’s just the beST reunion ever. They’re going to fix everything later and he’s like idk where i’m sleeping and lance is like my room! Me my room lol and he holds his hand and keith BLUSHES and the group just kinda stares and then starts WHOOpING and they’re like oh thank GOD we spent too many years watching this awful pining from keith and this obliviousness and constant denial from lance and now you’ve all come to terms and THANK YOU GOD! Anyways they go to lance’s room and they’re tired af and they’re watching a movie on the couch and lance lazily kisses him. And it’s fucking perfect.
  * CHAPTER 32 EPILOGUE BASICALLY (lance pov) the whole garrison semester is ending. Shiro and matt and pidge’s dad are head ppl at the garrison and keith is going to visit lance’s family! They meet and fun xmas stuff. (keith pov) he finds his dad. Go back to that. You already wrote it. (lance pov) they’re at the beach in arizona. It’s night and they’re looking at the stars and moon. Reminiscing. It’s perfect, isn’t it?  




**THE REBEL GROUP (THE MARKKU):**

The rebel group is a group of Galra who are trying to overtake the Blade of Marmora. Very extremist, very high tech. LEADERS= Sigrun, Morfran, and Bruns. Morfran and Bruns are really good with the Galra ppl, Sigrun is the infiltrator. The device used to connect keith with the alteans? What the markku uses to communicate with each other.

  
**How keith will disband them:** **  
**Keith cant do much ANYWAYS bc he looks human even tho he’s half galra, so he has to learn how to use all this (stolen) galra tech so that he can get some intel. Lotor helps him from afar. So he’s going to NOT ask his mentor kolivan (who im going to make a fucking DICK bc he’s given keith so many problems tbh) and work with team altea.

_ Sigrun and Quirina!: _

So she’s basically one of the leaders of the markku, and she’s up there because she used to be part of the bom. She was friends with keefs MOM!!! Quirina (his MUMZA) and her were on a mission, and Sigrun _had_ to finish what she was doing, despite their time running out and the members telling them to leave. She had taken too long, and they (kolivan, thorynx, most of the ppl who die first) decided to leave, but Quirina wouldn’t leave her to die. So she had gone back to get her, but by then time had ran out, and they were taken as prisoners. They had cells together and had learned about one another, in which...SIGRUN KNOWS KEITH IS HER BBY BOY! She’s like “ur mom was always doin things her own way hence why she went to earth and fucked ur dad” and keef’s just like wHAt and she’s like yeah that was alll before the shit went down with me she was SUPPOSED to go find out about humans and all bc they never interact with aliens and she got caught by your dad and he’s like wtf?? Ur purple?? And yellow eyes??? And she’s like begging him not to oust her and he takes her in but demands answers and she gives it to him and for some reason ur dad believes it and takes care of her and talks about humans and they’re able to look past each others differences and bam! Fall in love and then u were made and birthed and then quirina reaallly wanted to never come back but she knew it was her duty to as a blade of marmora, and for her son and love of her life rlly to live, so she leaves a knife with his dad with the bom sign. And it’s literally the worst thing she’s ever had to do and she’s never the same when she gets back, and after that experience she becomes concerned for others and putting their lives ahead and _caring_ , literally the opposite of what the bom does. That’s how sigrun falls for her, really. Kolivan also had a massive fucking crush on quirina and was ultimately _Really Mad_ about her and earth family, hence why he either treats keith like shit or is really careful with him. “Quirina was _so_ easy to fall for, wasn’t she, Kolivan? You and I both did it.” Anyways quirina dies in one of those battles against the warriors/gladiators (NOT BY SHIRO). Sigrun is a prisoner until the war ends, hence why she never gets back into the bom. But she knows everything about them. Sigrun is “accidental villain” bc she knows keith is quirina’s boy from the start, but when she finds out he’s leading the mission against the markuu it becomes conflicting for her. She uses him kind of as revenger/jealousy plot of quirina being so infatuated with her family back on earth and all (sigrun HATES that—like it’s oVER fall for me) but she also doesnt want to hurt keith bc that’s all that is left of her, and she also thought they were becoming good friends. So quirina is the best mom ever and sigrun is….complicated

keiths dad (this one i was never too sure of bc it got a little personal on my end lol):

Did his best to raise keith alone, had a LOT of trouble doing that, fell into alcoholism and all, keith was taken away by social services → foster child. At the end, keith finds him and decides to contact him. David’s up for it and they eat. Keith tells him as much as he can, and tbh for the first time he’s content with his dad. David tells him about his recovery and how he got to where he is—business, director at a high end company and all. Keith tells david about quirina and he’s visibly sad, but nothing really hurts him. Keith sheds some tears talking about it, but david just looks on. Keith  _ wants  _ to be comforted by his dad, but it doesnt happen at all. Keith mentions about the knife and music box, keith says he kept them. David whips out a flash drive, telling him it’s for him.’David does his best to not mention quirina and aliens—keith finds that suspicious. Keith thanks him. David mentions he has another son—three years old, and he loves gummy bears. He has a wife too. Keith kind of feels a pang in his chest, but he lets it slide. Dinner ends, and david asks if keith can drop him off. He agrees, taking him to this huge fucking mansion. Keith parks and gets off, but david stops him from going any further. Keith wants to meet his extended family, but david says they dont know about him, or quirina. Keith is confused, and asks why, and david’s answer is what gets him mad. David, falling in love with an alien, having an alien son, and that son being taken  _ away  _ from him due to alcoholism? Not exactly what anybody wants to hear or  _ believe.  _ David erased the whole extraterrestrial things from his head because it would effect his position and  _ life _ at the moment. He says this would be the last meeting between the two of them, because he cant have keith coming back into his life. He hopes he can enjoy the flashdrive. “So thats it—you fix your life and forget about the truth, about quirina, about your  _ son, _ and everythings perfect? That’s why you let your five year old son jump from house to house, trying to find something he can call  _ home,  _ somewhere he can be  _ loved _ —all so you can just...fix yourself and forget what you left behind?” At the door, his wife and son wait for him. Keith goes home, visibly upset, but saying everything is fine. Lance texts hom asking how it went, and all he says it was good and that he’s going to turn in early. Ofc he doesnt and looks into that flashdrive. Theres 1 video file,1 photo, and 1 audio file. Keith gets hella nervous and goes haywire looking for his music box, throwing everything in his room. He finds it in the back of a shelf, and his hands shake as he holds it and goes back to his computer. He clicks the photo and it’s quirina’s back, with keith sleeping on her shoulder, sitting on the roof, with the stars in the back. Then he clicks the audio file. It’s quirina asking david how to say ‘it’ in his language. David asks what, she says ‘i love you,’ he laughs and says ‘saranghaeyo.’ Quirina says “keith-ah, saranghaeyo,’ and a baby’s laugh is heard in response. David laughs: keith-ah? Quirina: yeah, you call him that when you’re speaking your language. Did i say it right? David: dammit, quirina,  _ saranghaeyo _ . He plays the first video. It takes a few seconds to focus, but it’s quirina sitting at the edge of a bed and baby keith giggles softly. He holds her single finger, looking for it. She starts to softly sing the galra lullaby in the original language, and keith stop giggling and merely smiles. When she finishes is, he still hasnt slept. She says something in galra, opens a drawer, takes out the music box, cranks it; and then begins singing in english (to tune of river flows in you)

_ Wrap your fingers around my thumb _

_ This life of yours has just begun _

_ I put your smile in my memory _

_ But that won’t be enough _

_   
_ _ Two worlds live in you _ _   
_ _ Take your time to understand _ _   
_ _ Trust me, son, you’ll see this through _

_ This lullaby from Daibazaal will remind you to _

_   
_ _ There’ll be a time when you're alone _

_ I wish I could stay to help _

_ Yet here I go, saying goodbye _

_ I’m sorry, son, but I do this for you _

_   
_ _ Purple eyes shut asleep _ _   
_ _ I leave you with your dreams _ _   
_ _ Rest is what makes us strong _ _   
_ _ Earth is where you belong _ _   
_ _   
_ _ My arms hold you, no matter what _ _   
_ _ I’m your shield, protect what’s near _ _   
_ _ This world is cruel, but have no fear _ _   
_ _ Your mother’s love is always here _

_   
_ _ So when I leave, and when you wake _ _   
_ _ Please don’t cry my name _ _   
_ _ Promise me you’ll feel _ _   
_ _ Your strength, your shield, my arms, my love _ _   
_ _ It all stays the same, no distance tears it apart _ _   
_ __ Daibazaal knows this all

the lyrics are sweet, and keith begins to shed tears. When she finishes, keith’s asleep. David asks her if those are really the lyrics, she says she tweaked some for keith. She turns around and sees the camera and smiles, remind david silently to not film her. He whispers back, the camera shaking a little bc he’s laughing, saying it’s just for him to remember. Lance asks what he’s watching, and keith is surprised to see him watching at the door. He sees the tear stains, and asks if he’s ok. Thats when he breaks, and lance is holding him so fucking quick. The video plays again automatically, and he just cries more. Once he calms down a little, he tells lance that the meeting ended terribly, he fills him in and all. lance tells him keith’s  _ always _ had a family—them.

that's it folks!


End file.
